Why is my site not working on Internet Explorer 11?

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Internet Explorer 11’s last update was back on July 29th, 2015 and current use of this browser (with Microsoft Edge having superseded) is now tiny within Ireland with 0.77% market share.

Is Internet Explorer 11 the last version of Internet Explorer?

According to Microsoft, yes, Internet Explorer 11 is the last major version of Internet Explorer. Internet Explorer 11 will continue receiving security updates and technical support for the lifecycle of the version of Windows on which it is installed.

So, there is a balancing act between providing a good user experience for every browser type, which includes extra code, and keeping the site fast and light for the other 95% of users. We cannot use the latest and greatest technologies if we try to support an ancient browser. Microsoft Edge has long superseded Internet Explorer, and they are now working on a Chrome fork for their next browser iteration. We are moving forward.

It is our job to also inform our customers that the decision to support IE 11 is a very short-sighted one.

• By using Internet Explorer, developers are punishing their customers. JavaScript would need to be compiled to ES5 instead of ES6, which increases the bundle size in some cases by 30%. So a significant performance decrease for 97% of users.
• By using Internet Explorer, development time increased by 30%. The time that could be spent on new features/quality improvement.
• By using Internet Explorer, maintenance time increases. As code gets ‘hacked’ for IE and workarounds are being researched.
• By using Internet Explorer, the development time is about 10–30% higher.

In our development roadmap, in response to Chrome & Firefox scheduled release of native lazy loading, we adopted this within the Supernova theme (Chrome-only with a fallback for Firefox) – read about IE 11 and lazy loading. This allows for images to only be loaded when in view, bringing huge performance advantages, especially in terms of speed. This update will not be supported by Explorer, and therefore it does not make sense to sacrifice better UX for the 95% for the benefit of the very few.

Suggested Actions

What we do is detect the user browser and flash up a warning sign if their browser is not supported. This is a common feature in the best-of-class websites. We are also monitoring user devices and technology via Google Analytics, and react, if required, to any local peculiarities.