How to: Create a Shortcut To A Website in Edge
Windows 10, the latest and greatest iteration of the Windows Operating System, comes with two different internet browsers: Internet Explorer, the default Windows browser we all know but don’t really love, and Microsoft Edge, a fast, more secure, and simpler internet browser. Microsoft developed Edge to rival the third-party internet browsers that almost all Windows users believe to be superior to Internet Explorer. Microsoft touts Microsoft Edge as an internet browser that is as good as, if not better than, its competition.
Despite its many features, Microsoft Edge lacks certain functionalities present in competitors like Google Chrome. For example, it doesn’t allow users to pin an open website to their computer’s taskbar for easy access – a simple yet highly useful feature available on most other internet browsers, including Internet Explorer. To pin a site, users would typically just drag a website tab down to the taskbar, but this action isn’t supported in Microsoft Edge.”
Fortunately for you, there is a way to pin a Microsoft Edge tab to your taskbar. However, it is not as convenient as simply dragging and dropping an open tab onto it. Until Microsoft decides to update Edge with a feature that allows users to do this, if you want to pin a tab to your taskbar, you need to:
Right-click on an empty space on your Desktop, hover over New and click on Shortcut.
Type the location of the item” field, paste the following. Replace “facebook.com” with the URL you want the shortcut in your taskbar to open.
%windir%\explorer.exe microsoft-edge:https://www.facebook.com
Click on ‘Next.’ Name your shortcut (for example, ‘Facebook’).
Create the shortcut. Right-click on the shortcut and click on Pin to taskbar.
Voila! You’re done. Now, whenever you click on the shortcut in your taskbar, a Microsoft Edge tab will open, taking you to the URL you have created a shortcut for. If the shortcut does not work, create a new one. This time, surround the URL in the location for the shortcut (https://www.facebook.com – for example) with quotation marks (“) on both sides. The finished location for the shortcut should look like the following:
%windir%\explorer.exe microsoft-edge:”https://www.facebook.com”
If you don’t like the bland icon that the shortcut has by default, download the .ico file for a more fitting shortcut icon from www.iconarchive.com. Before you pin the shortcut to your taskbar, right-click on it and click on Properties > Change Icon. Navigate to the directory where the .ico file you downloaded is stored, select the .ico file you downloaded, and click on OK in both windows. Doing so will enhance your taskbar shortcut for a specific URL in Microsoft Edge.
