A few weeks, a build from the stable branch leaked of Microsoft"s new Chromium-based Edge browser. As found by HTNovo, the same thing happened today, and this time, it"s easier to install. The link provided does come directly from Microsoft, rather than some of the shadier leaks that we"ve seen from private cloud storage accounts.
First of all, it"s very likely that this build isn"t what Microsoft would call stable at all. Just like when Edge Beta - which still isn"t publicly available - back in May, the team has to test out each of the channels, even if they"re not public. So yes, that means that it has to test out a stable channel as well. As was the case with the Beta channel, you probably won"t be getting anything more stable than if you were using the Dev channel.
It could mean that Microsoft is actually getting closer to a public release though. After all, the last time a so-called stable build of Edge leaked, it wasn"t easy to install it, if it was possible at all. Now, you just have to run the installation file.
If you do choose to install this build, it"s going to take the place of Edge Spartan in the Start Menu and in the taskbar. When we installed it on a test machine, it added a new Edge icon to the taskbar, but even the old one launched the new Edge. To be fair, this is similar behavior to if you install Edge Dev on the latest version of Windows 10 1903.
Of course, if you miss Edge Spartan, you can always go back. Uninstalling Edge Chromium seems to put things back the way they were. Once this goes public and Edge Chromium officially replaces Edge Spartan, it"s unlikely that Microsoft will continue to allow users to uninstall it though, since that could leave users without a web browser, as we were told at Build earlier this year.