How to bring back Browser mode in IE11

Question

UPDATE  The old question applies only to IE11 preview  browser mode had returned in final release of IE11  But there is a catch  it is next to useless  because it does not emulate conditional comments  For example  if you use them to enable HTML5 support in legacy IEs  you will no longer be able to debug your site in IE11            lt  -- if lte IE 8  gt               lt script src  html5shiv js  gt  lt  script gt           lt   endif -- gt    Read another StackOverflow question and IE bug tracker issue  Microsoft never responded to this  so it looks like they introduced this bug on purpose to steer people into buying BrowserStack subscriptions  Conditional comment emulation worked just fine in preview release   ORIGINAL QUESTION  When IE11 preview is installed on Windows 7  it comes with old-fashioned F12 tool which allows to change browser modes    However  if you go to  Tools  menu and select  F12  developers tool  it gets replaced with new developer tools  and  Browser mode  is no longer available    The only way to bring it back is to uninstall IE11 and reinstall it   Is there easier way to switch between browser modes in IE11

User · Answer

Microsoft has a tool just for this purpose: Microsoft Expression Web. There's a free version with a bunch of FrontPage/Dreamweaver-like garbage that nobody wants. What's important is that it has a great browser testing feature. I'm running Windows 8.1 Pro (final release, not preview) with Internet Explorer 11. I get these local browsers:

Internet Explorer 6
Internet Explorer 7
Internet Explorer 11 /!\ Unsupported Version (can't use it; big whoop, I have the browser)

Then I get a Remote Browsers (Beta) option. I'm supposed to sign up with a valid e-mail, but there's an error communicating with the server. Oh well.

Firefox used to be supported, but I don't see it now. Might be hiding.

I can compare side-by-side between browser versions. I can also compare with an image, or apparently, a PSD file (no idea how well that works). InDesign would be nice, but that's probably asking for too much.

I have the full version of Expression partially installed as well due to Visual Studio Ultimate being on the same computer, so I'd appreciate someone confirming in a comment that my free installation isn't automatically upgrading.

Update: Looks like the online service was discontinued, but local browsers are still supported. You can also download just SuperPreview, without the editor garbage. If you want the full IDE, the latest version is Microsoft Expression Web 4 (Free Version). Here's the official list of supported browsers. IE6 seems to give an error on Windows 8.1, but IE7 works.

Update 2014-12-09: Microsoft has pretty much given up on this. Don't expect it to work well.

User · Answer

UPDATE   The original question  and the answer below applied specifically to the IE11 preview releases   The final release version of IE11 does in fact provide the ability to switch browser modes from the Emulation tab in the dev tools     Having said that  the advice I ve given here  and elsewhere  to avoid using compatibility modes for testing is still valid  If you want to test your site for compatibility with older IE versions  you should always do your testing in a real copy of those IE version   However  this does mean that the registry hack described in  EugeneXa s answer to bring back the old dev tools is no longer necessary  since the new dev tools do now have the feature he was missing     ORIGINAL ANSWER   The IE devs have deliberately deprecated the ability to switch browser mode   There are not many reasons why people would be switching modes in the dev tools  but one of the main reasons is because they want to test their site in old IE versions  Unfortunately  the various compatibility modes that IE supplies have never really been fully compatible with old versions of IE  and testing using compat mode is simply not a good enough substitute for testing in real copies of IE8  IE9  etc   The IE devs have recognised this and are deliberately making it harder for devs to make this mistake   The best practice is to use real copies of each IE version to test your site instead   The various compatiblity modes are still available inside IE11  but can only be accessed if a site explicitly states that it wants to run in compat mode  You would do this by including an X-UA-Compatible header on your page   And the Document Mode drop-box is still available  but will only ever offer the options of  Edge   that is  the best mode available to the current IE version  so IE11 mode in IE11  or the mode that the page is running in   So if you go to a page that is loaded in compat mode  you will have the option to switch between the specific compat mode that the page was loaded in or IE11  Edge  mode   And if you go to a page that loads in IE11 mode  then you will only be offered the  edge  mode and nothing else   This means that it does still allow you to test how a compat mode page reacts to being updated to work in Edge mode  which is about the only really legitimate use-case for the document mode drop-box anyway   The IE11 Document Mode drop box has an i icon next to it which takes you to the modern ie website  The point of this is to encourage you to download the VMs that MS are supplying for us to test our sites using real copies of each version of IE  This will give you a much more accurate testing experience  and is strongly enouraged as a much better practice than testing by switching the mode in dev tools   Hope that explains things a bit for you

User · Answer

Easiest way  especially if in MSDN  wasted hours of my time  stupid MS  http   support microsoft com kb 2900662 en-us sd rss   Open the Developer Tools pane  To do this  press F12  Open the Emulation screen  To do this  press Ctrl 8  On the Document mode list under Mode  click 9  On the User agent string list under Mode  click Internet Explorer 9

User · Answer

While using virtual machines is the best way of testing old IEs, it is possible to bring back old-fashioned F12 tools by editing registry as IE11 overwrites this value when new F12 tool is activated.

Thanks to awesome Dimitri Nickola? for this trick. enter image description here

This works for me (save as .reg file and run):

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Toolbar\WebBrowser]
"ITBar7Layout"=hex:13,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,30,00,00,00,10,00,00,00,\
  15,00,00,00,01,00,00,00,00,07,00,00,5e,01,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,\
  00,00,00,69,e3,6f,1a,8c,f2,d9,4a,a3,e6,2b,cb,50,80,7c,f1

User · Answer

You can get this using Emulation  Ctrl   8  Document mode  10 9 8 7 5   Browser Profile  Desktop  Windows Phone

User · Answer

In IE11 we can change user agent to IE10  IE9 and even as windows phone  It is really good

User · Answer

How to bring back    Browser mode    in IE11   Easy way to bring back is just go to Emulation  ctrl  8   and do change user agent string   see attached image

User · Answer

You can work around this by setting the X-UA-Compatible meta header for the specific version of IE you are debugging with. This will change the Browser Mode to the version you specify in the header.

For example:

<meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=9" />

In order for the Browser Mode to update on the Developer Tools, you must close [the Developer Tools] and reopen again. This will switch to that specific version.

Switching from a minor version to a greater version will work just fine by refreshing, but if you want to switch back from a greater version to a minor version, such as from 9 to 7, you would need to open a new tab and load the page again.

Here's a screenshot:

enter image description here

[cross-browser] How to bring back "Browser mode" in IE11?

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