Windows Update Makes it Harder to Switch to Google Chrome
Quick change to Google Chrome as the default browser has become a thing of the past with the recent Windows 10 and 11 updates.
Probably most of you are familiar with the moment when you install Google Chrome and the first time you launch it, a bar appears, enabling you to immediately change the default browser. As it turns out, with the April patches for Windows 10 and 11, this message has become history.
This situation was initiated by updates KB5025221 for Windows 10 and KB5025224 for Windows 11. They include:
- Windows 10 editions for corporate and education customers running on version 20H2;
- All editions of Windows 10 21H2;
- All editions of Windows 11 21H2.
Both of these updates were released on April 11 and made it impossible to quickly change the default browser to Google Chrome. Instead, you have to go into the Windows application settings to make the change.
What's worse, however, is that these updates have begun to cause problems for users. This is because, according to posts on Microsoft's official forum, after their installation, every time you launch the browser, it opens the system settings window. Interestingly, this problem occurs even if Google Chrome is set as the default web browsing application.
The latest reports of the problem are from a week ago. It is likely, therefore, that the bug is still present. If you are experiencing it, the not-so-simple way to eliminate it is to remove the faulty update.
While it may seem that Microsoft is trying to forcefully make the change process more difficult and thus encourage people to use Edge, it may in fact also be about security. As editors at TechRadar point out, setting Google Chrome as the default browser requires making changes to the Windows registry. So it is possible that the absence of this option occurred by accident.
