Microsoft Edge and Web Apps

Microsoft Edge lets you install web apps in Windows 11 alongside traditional desktop applications, Microsoft Store mobile apps, and other types of apps. These web apps are accessible from outside Microsoft Edge and look and behave more like apps than web pages.

You can also use Microsoft Edge to “install” any web page so that it can be launched outside of the browser as well.

So what’s the difference between a web app and a web page?

It may seem like a subtle distinction, but true web apps—called Progressive Web Apps, or PWAs—can interact with the underlying platform in ways that are more sophisticated than simpler web pages. Key among this functionality is a set of features that allow web apps to behave like native apps: they can work when your PC is offline, for example, and display native Windows 11 notifications, and they can access the file system and more of the hardware in your PC.

By comparison, web pages are more limited: they cannot be used while the PC is offline, and if they support notifications, they are delivered by the web browser and not by Windows 11.

From a usability perspective, the differences between a web app and a web page don’t matter much if you’re online as both can be used side-by-side along with all of the various types of apps supported by Windows 11. The biggest difference, in some ways, is how you add them to Windows 11 for use outside the browser.

Install a web app

Web apps promote themselves as such with an “App available” icon on the right side of the Microsoft Edge Address bar. (This icon resembles three building blocks with a plus sign.)

To install this web app, click the “App available” icon. An installation prompt will appear.

Click install. The web app will appear in its own windows outside of Microsoft Edge and present a short list of options for you to configure.

Your choices include:

Pin to taskbar. This option, which is selected by default, will cause the web app to be pinned to the Taskbar.

Pin to Start. This option, which is selected by default, will cause the web app to be added to the Start menu. You will see it at the bottom of the Pinned section and in the All apps list.

Create Desktop shortcut. If selected, this option will create a shortcut to the web app to the Windows 11 Desktop.

Auto-start on device login. If selected, this option will cause the web app to run every time you sign into Windows 11.

Depending on the web app, you can manage this behavior using the Startup apps view in Task Manager or the Startup apps settings interface in the Settings app (at Apps > Startup). But Microsoft Edge also offers its own interface for managing web app behavior. That is described later in this chapter.

Install a web page as if it were an app

If you visit a particular web page regularly and would like to access it from the Windows 11 Start menu or Taskbar from outside of Microsoft Edge, and it doesn’t promote itself as an installable web app, you can still pin a shortcut to that page. This will provide a web app-like experience.

Getting started, however, is a bit less obvious than installing a real web app. To install any web page as if it were a web app, display it with Microsoft Edge, open Settings and more (“…”), and then navigate to Apps > Install this site as an app. Edge will prompt you to install it and give you the option of renaming it.

When you click install, you will see the same behavior as with a real web app, with the same set of options noted in the previous section, including the ability to pin the page to the Taskbar and/or Start menu and so on. These installed web pages work and are managed just like web apps too.

Microsoft Edge has a separate but somewhat related capability whereby you can pin a web page to the Taskbar or Start menu by navigating to Settings and more (“…”) > More tools and then choose “Pin to taskbar” or “Pin to Start.” These pinned items will open as a browser tab in Edge, however, and will not appear in the Apps management interface noted below.

Use installed web apps and pages alongside other apps

For the most part, installed web apps look and behave like the other types of apps you use with Windows 11. The app windows can be resized, positioned, maximized, and restored normally, for example.

But there are a few unique features in web app windows, each of which is related to the app’s underlying web technologies and is exposed in the app’s title bar.

These can include:

Back. As with Microsoft Edge, the Back button is used for basic web page navigation. It is enabled when the Back operation is available.

You can also type ALT + LEFT ARROW to go back. And you can click and hold on Back to access a history list.

Oddly, web apps will not display a Forward button when that operation is available. But you can always type ALT + RIGHT ARROW to go forward (when available).

Refresh. As with any web page, you can refresh the view in a web app at any time using the “Refresh” button, causing it to reload.

You can also type “CTRL + R” or “F5” to refresh the current view.

Open sidebar search. This option opens a Sidebar search pane in the web app window so that you can search the web with Microsoft Bing without disturbing the app you’re using. This is a stripped-down version of the Search pane from the Edge Sidebar that we discuss in Microsoft Edge Basics.

You can also type CTRL + SHIFT + E to open the Sidebar search pane.

Settings and more. As with Microsoft Edge itself, each installed web app has its own “Settings and more” (“…”) menu that lets you access basic web app settings like pinning and permissions. But it also provides a way to access your browser’s extensions—which are configured to work normally with your web apps—and other browser tools like Page zoom, Print, Share, Find on page, and more.

Manage installed web apps and pages

You can manage the web apps you installed with Microsoft Edge in various ways.

As noted above, many options are available from a web app’s “Settings and more” menu, including such things as pinning, permissions, and which extensions it can use.

And you can, of course, directly interact with web apps right in Windows 11 as you do with other apps: you can unpin an installed web app from the Taskbar by right-clicking it and choosing “Unpin from taskbar.” Or you can find it in the Start menu, right-click and choose “Uninstall” to uninstall it.

But Microsoft Edge also offers its own Apps interface for centrally managing installed web apps. This interface lets you access all of the functionality noted above for each installed web app. But it also provides additional features related to web apps you may have installed on other PCs.

To access this interface, open a Microsoft Edge window and navigate to Settings and more (“…”) > Apps > Manage apps.

You can also navigate directly to edge://apps/ using the Edge Address bar.

Here, you will see all of the web apps you installed with Microsoft Edge on this PC. And, in the “Your available apps” section, a list of web apps you installed on other PCs: this lets you more easily install those apps here without having to manually find them on the web first.

Most of the options here should be obvious. Each installed app has a “More options” (“…”) link that lets you determine whether it runs at startup. You can also use this link to uninstall a web app.