Microsoft's Windows Defender Application Guard has been added to the upcoming Chromium-based Microsoft Edge. This security feature allows you to securely browse the web without fear of becoming infected by malicious sites.

Windows Defender Application Guard is a Windows 10 feature that enables Microsoft Edge to launch in an environment that is walled off from the rest of the operating system. This sandbox allows users to open web pages and perform other activities online without fear of infecting the operating system.

In order to utilize Application Guard in the new Microsoft Edge, the Windows 10 feature first needs to be installed via the Windows Features control panel.

Windows Features Settings

Once Application Guard is installed, a new flag will be available in edge://flags called "Microsoft Edge Application Guard" as shown below. To enable this feature, set this flag to Enabled and restart the browser.

Microsoft Edge Application Guard Flag

Now that Application Guard is enabled, if you click on the Edge menu you will see an option labeled "New Application Guard windows" as shown below.

Launch Application Guard

When you click the New Application Guard window option, the browser will prepare the Application Guard sandbox and launch a new Chromium Edge session inside it.

Launching Microsoft Edge in Application Guard

When Microsoft Edge is running under Application Guard, it is indicated by an icon with a shield to the right of the address bar. If you click on this icon, it will indicate that it is an Application Guard session.

Application Guard Indicator

To close the Application Guard session, you simply close the browser.

Not 100% finished

While Application Guard is now integrated into the new Microsoft Edge, it is still not 100% finished.

Edge sessions will be launched into sandboxed environments and downloads will be prevented from being launched, but the browser will not display an error message indicating why a download or some other insecure action was blocked.

Normally when you try to open a downloaded file in an Application Guard session, Edge will display a warning that you are not allowed to do so.

Blocked by Application Guard

The new Edge does not have these warnings added as of yet.

It is still promising to see the Edge team integrate features that are unique to Microsoft and Windows 10.

With this feature added, the new Microsoft Edge continue to move further away from other Chromium-based browsers and allows it to stand out as a unique and worthy contender to Google Chrome.