Challenge of the day: Make Google your default search provider in IE 11 on Win10

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The method’s changed since the last time I looked. Tricky, Microsoft. (Protip: To make sure that you really set the default search provider, restart I
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Have had Insider Build 14352 since 5/20. No problem. Google was/is my default search provider. Tools/Manage Add-ons/Search Providers or Internet Options/Manage Add-ons/Search Providers, right click Google/Set as default or button “Set as default”

When IE11 opened I chose “don’t use default settings” in the pop-up box. If you use default settings (the default( it changes homepage to BING and default search provider to BING,

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Can you even uninstall IE or Edge in Win 10? That would be my first choice if I had Windows 10.

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Woody, I think it’s been like this for some time. Tools > Manage Add-ons > Search Providers. Set whichever you like as default.

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Hopefully the same method would also allow one to make StartPage HTTPS or DuckDuckGo their default search engine, for those who prefer the added privacy.

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So how DO you do it now? (Just asking).

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Open Internet Explorer
Click Settings button
Manage add-ons
Click Search Providers
(At the bottom) click Find more search providers…
Under Internet Explorer Gallery, select Google Search, click Add button
Click Add in the Dialog box
Close all dialog boxes, open again Manage add-ons, Search Providers.
Google Search should be in position 2.
Roght-click on it, Set default.
Right-click again, Move up
Now Bing is in position 2, non-default. If this is prefered, right click on Bing and delete.
Close.

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Hi Woody, it seemed to work the normal way. Tools>Manage Addons>Search Providers>Find more search providers. Then you get the I.E Gallery and add Google Search as normal. Wait a while, close IE, restart it, and Google will be among the search providers. Make it the default and there you are. It stayed as the default after an IE restart and also a complete computer restart I am using Win10 14352.rs1_release.160522-1930 on my test machine (not the one I am writing this on as the Win 10 machine is in a colder room!!

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Interesting. In the old days, you could set the default right after installing a new search engine. With IE 11 now, you have to restart IE. Also, back in the day, you could click “Add” in the lower right corner of the search drop-down box, choose a new search provider, and (in a separate dialog box) set it as default.

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See earlier reply.

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But it’s now a two-step process, where you have to restart IE in the middle (I don’t think that’s documented anywhere is it? Or did I miss something?) Also, there used to be a quick way to do it with the “Add” button…

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I assume you can “uninstall” IE in Win10, the same way you can in Win8 – but it won’t be completely uninstalled. As for Edge, dunno, never tried.

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The “Set as default” check box is missing in iegallery when you add the provider, but it’s been that way since MS cut the number of search providers way down. There used to be scads of them, now only a few.

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Agreed. My company has internal apps that are tied to IE11 so I have to use it for those. For everything else, I use SeaMonkey. Even though I almost never use IE for searches, the first thing I did was change the default search engine to Google. Bing? Not now. Not ever!

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Any idea how long ago that was? You can tell I haven’t tried to change search engines in IE 11 for a long, long time. Going through the book, I’m discovering all sorts of tidbits….

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Not sure. Maybe last year sometime. Been a WHILE. Maybe when they stopped support for all other versions of IE?

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I was just going to say that it is obvious that IE11 (or any IE version) is not your favourite browser.
I am not sure what has changed, but if you feel that this is the case, it must be since IE10, as IE10 and IE11 are very close to each other.

Just being at this subject, there was an issue not so long ago when the users who had the system installed with the Australian locales were redirected to a page where Google Search was not offered. Other than knowing exactly how to configure the registry with GUIDs, the only alternative was to manually go to the US page where Google search was still offered.
This issue seems to be corrected now.

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It’s not just for Windows 10. I just built a new Win7 workstation and tried to make Google the default search provider through the old process of adding it. But even there, you can just set it as an additional search provider and then have to go through Manage Add-ons and switch it there (and/or remove Bing).

This is a like a game of ever-shifting goal posts.

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You *could* do it recently just during the adding process (in Windows 7). There were multiple selection options when you added it that also immediately let you set it as the default. That has changed.

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It still worked in a 1-step process until earlier this year. I was building some Win7 boxes with IE11 and could set Google as the default right in the adding process. This has now changed.

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Thanks! I thought it was new – although admittedly I don’t use IE enough to tell for sure.

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If you’re already using Google as your default search engine, why not use Chrome as your browser? Problem solved, unless you are a business who has apps which are IE-dependent.

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