Microsoft Edge Insider Canary now switches themes with your Windows settings (update)

By Dan Thorp-Lancaster
last updated

The Microsoft Edge Canary channel can now match your Windows dark and light theme settings automatically.

Updated May 16, 2019: It appears the theme setting has been present in prior releases as well (thanks to KeegdnaB42 for the tip in the comments). You can still follow the steps below to enable it if you're willing to give the experimental feature a try.

What you need to know

  • The latest Microsoft Edge Canary channel update adds new theme settings.
  • Available as an experimental flag, you can now set Edge to match your Windows theme settings automatically.
  • While it's labeled as experimental right now, it's likely we'll see the option make its way to the general settings menu as a basic feature, like other apps, in the final release.

Microsoft has pushed a fresh update to the Edge Insider Canary channel, bringing a handy new feature for your theme settings. Available as an experimental option in Edge's development flags, you can now set the browser to automatically switch between dark and light themes based on your Windows system settings (via TechDows; OnMSFT).

To enable the feature, you'll want to make sure you're running the latest Edge Canary build. From there, you can head to "edge://flags" in the address bar and search for "themes" from the search box. Simply toggle the feature labeled "Microsoft Edge theme" to "on," and Edge will then automatically transition from dark to light, or vice versa, when you change your default system theme in the "Colors" portion of the personalization settings in Windows.

Unlike the Page Translation feature that shipped to Canary users in April, there are no further settings to toggle.

In addition to today's Canary updates on Windows, preview testers of Microsoft Edge for iOS can now sync their favorites between the iOS app and the Edge Insider channels on Windows. This feature is already available on Android.

See more

To test out the new theme settings, you can download the latest Canary build from the Microsoft Edge Insider site. If you'd rather go with a more stable build, you can also opt for testing the Dev channel, which is updated once a week and should receive another update before the week is over.

See at Microsoft

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Dan Thorp-Lancaster
Dan Thorp-Lancaster

Dan Thorp-Lancaster is the former Editor-in-Chief of Windows Central. He began working with Windows Central, Android Central, and iMore as a news writer in 2014 and is obsessed with tech of all sorts. You can follow Dan on Twitter @DthorpL and Instagram @heyitsdtl. 

8 Comments
  • Did I miss something? The theme option has been in the experimental flags since the initial release, or did they change it in some way?
  • Same thing I was thinking. Unless the old flag was a simple toggle, rather than using system settings. I don't remember.
  • Will they bring back the square tabs? Weird how Firefox looks more like Edge than the new Edge from MS.
  • I also like the square corners. Differentiates from the competition.
  • I think Microsoft is moving to more rounded corners for Fluent Design in the future.
  • You know what piss me off about Microsoft? Okay, so they want to compete with Chrome – not an easy task, pretty freaking hard. But, okay, fine. What are you doing different from everybody (or most people)? Are you... I don't know, releasing a mobile version of edge which support to extensions and background playback? Maybe releasing a mobile browser with support to multiple search engines (I can't think of any browser to Android/iOS with this feature currently) But, no, they are not doing this. They are not going where anyone else has gone before. On the contrary, they are taking away features that virtually every goddamned browser has it nowadays (such as support to multiple search engines in their desktop versions... I mean, for god's sake I don't even know why did they do that. It's something so stupid to do, is as if they want to make their browser worst on purpose.
  • Using custom search engines is available in Chrome and Edge mobile and also Edge Desktop...
  • Still slower than Chrome and eats more RAM.