Edge browser speed boasts and mobile Office clarifications

Published by at

The frequency of blog posts from the Microsoft Windows teams is increasing as we get closer to the official day of availability of Windows 10 on the desktop (July 29th) and, shortly after, on smartphones as well, as Windows 10 Mobile. Yesterday, accompanying the release (to Insiders) of what may be the build submitted to manufacturers, saw an interesting post with information about the desktop release, about the new Microsoft Edge browser (which I've been enjoying on the Lumia 1520), and about Office Mobile. See the quotes below.

Windows 10 dev logo

From the Microsoft blog post:

The Edge team has been continuing to optimize performance since first adding the new browser to Windows 10. In this build, Microsoft Edge is even better and is beating Chrome and Safari on their own JavaScript benchmarks:

  • On WebKit Sunspider, Edge is 112% faster than Chrome
  • On Google Octane, Edge is 11% faster than Chrome
  • On Apple JetStream, Edge is 37% faster than Chrome

We’re really pleased with those performance gains and we hope that you’ll enjoy faster browsing with Microsoft Edge along with the many great features we’ve added over the last several builds.

Which is especially good to hear from the phone side of things - Windows Phones haven't exactly been over-specified and at least web browsing will be as fast as humanly possible once the Windows 10 Mobile update hits.

With regard to Office:

Thanks to all of you who have been using the new Office Word, Excel, and PowerPoint mobile apps on Windows 10. There are a few changes to the apps coming up that are part of helping them get ready for their release with Windows 10. You may have already noticed that on PCs and tablets we’ve added “Mobile” to the app names (to help distinguish them from the Office desktop suite), while on phones we simply call the apps Word, Excel and PowerPoint. We will also remove “Preview” from the app names and in about one week, you will need an Office 365 subscription to edit on Windows 10 PCs and larger tablets.

Similar to what we announced in March, viewing and most editing will remain free for non-commercial use on devices of 10.1” or less. Otherwise, you will need a qualifying Office 365 subscription. If you don’t have an Office 365 subscription, you can sign up for a free trial at www.office.com/try. You can also always edit your documents for free in Office Online at www.office.com. The full featured OneNote Universal App will come installed with Windows 10 and similar to OneNote on all other devices, editing is free.

So - much as expected then - we've had Office editing baked into the phones since day one and this won't change. And arguably adds an extra bump in value to phablets like the Lumia 1520 and 640 XL (I can't imagine much Office editing goes on beneath the 5"-screen form factor in real life).

Incidentally, other sites have been reporting that the 'Preview' tags have already gone in the Office Mobile applications for Windows 10 Mobile - not so fast, or at least this isn't the case yet in the UK. But I'm sure it's imminent.

Finally, there's the tease:

Stay tuned for more news about our launch activities, and at least one fun surprise for Windows Insiders coming up!

Hmm.... for desktop Insiders and/or phone Insiders? Maybe a new, free game? An online event? Vouchers for the Store? What's your guess?

Source / Credit: Microsoft