Disable "What do you want to do with" in Microsoft Edge

Martin Brinkmann
Feb 10, 2018
Internet
|
8

Microsoft's Edge web browser displays a "what do you want to do with" prompt when you download files in the browser by default. The prompt lists options to open, save or cancel the download, and another option to save the download to another location.

You may also get options to run the download if it is an executable file. While that is certainly useful in some situations, say you download a new program that you want to install on your system, it may be inconvenient at other times.

The prompt saves you some clicks in the best case but the main advantage that it provides is that it puts users in control when it comes to downloads.

what do you want to do with

Drive by download attacks don't really work if a prompt intercepts the download. While it may not offer 100% protection against all download related attacks, it will block some.

While it is usually a good idea to keep the prompt for that reason alone, some users may want to disable it. You may have no need for the prompt if all you want to do is save downloads to the local device. Then there is the issue of Edge only displaying one prompt at a time. The prompt is shown for only one of the downloads. If you are fast enough, you may be able to select an option before the next download starts but that may be inconvenient in itself.

Microsoft Edge users may disable the "What do you want to do with" prompt. This can be done in the following way:

  1. Open Microsoft Edge if the browser is not open already.
  2. Click on the menu icon, and select Settings from the context menu that opens when you do.
  3. Scroll down to Advanced Settings and click on "View Advanced Settings".
  4. Locate "Ask me what to do with each download" under Downloads, and toggle the preference to off.

Edge downloads all files automatically when you disable the option.  You set the default download directory under downloads as well.

edge download options

Note that this won't prevent the browser from displaying the "finished downloading" prompt which displays options to open or run the download, open the folder it was downloaded to, or open the download history of the web browser. There is no option currently to disable this prompt as well in Microsoft Edge,

Now You: How do you download files?

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Disable "What do you want to do with" in Microsoft Edge
Description
Microsoft's Edge web browser displays a "what do you want to do with" prompt when you download files in the browser by default. The prompt lists options to open, save or cancel the download, and another option to save the download to another location.
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Comments

  1. ilev said on August 4, 2012 at 7:53 pm
    Reply

    Doesn’t Windows 8 know that www. or http:// are passe ?

    1. Martin Brinkmann said on August 4, 2012 at 7:57 pm
      Reply

      Well it is a bit difficulty to distinguish between name.com domains and files for instance.

    2. Leonidas Burton said on September 4, 2023 at 4:51 am
      Reply

      I know a service made by google that is similar to Google bookmarks.
      http://www.google.com/saved

  2. VioletMoon said on August 16, 2023 at 5:26 pm
    Reply

    @Ashwin–Thankful you delighted my comment; who knows how many “gamers” would have disagreed!

  3. Karl said on August 17, 2023 at 10:36 pm
    Reply

    @Martin

    The comments section under this very article (3 comments) is identical to the comments section found under the following article:
    https://www.ghacks.net/2023/08/15/netflix-is-testing-game-streaming-on-tvs-and-computers/

    Not sure what the issue is, but have seen this issue under some other articles recently but did not report it back then.

  4. Anonymous said on August 25, 2023 at 11:44 am
    Reply

    Omg a badge!!!
    Some tangible reward lmao.

    It sucks that redditors are going to love the fuck out of it too.

  5. Scroogled said on August 25, 2023 at 10:57 pm
    Reply

    With the cloud, there is no such thing as unlimited storage or privacy. Stop relying on these tech scums. Purchase your own hardware and develop your own solutions.

    1. lollmaoeven said on August 27, 2023 at 6:24 am
      Reply

      This is a certified reddit cringe moment. Hilarious how the article’s author tries to dress it up like it’s anything more than a png for doing the reddit corporation’s moderation work for free (or for bribes from companies and political groups)

  6. El Duderino said on August 25, 2023 at 11:14 pm
    Reply

    Almost al unlmited services have a real limit.

    And this comment is written on the dropbox article from August 25, 2023.

  7. John G. said on August 26, 2023 at 1:29 am
    Reply

    First comment > @ilev said on August 4, 2012 at 7:53 pm

    For the God’s sake, fix the comments soon please! :[

  8. Kalmly said on August 26, 2023 at 4:42 pm
    Reply

    Yes. Please. Fix the comments.

  9. Kim Schmidt said on September 3, 2023 at 3:42 pm
    Reply

    With Google Chrome, it’s only been 1,500 for some time now.

    Anyone who wants to force me in such a way into buying something that I can get elsewhere for free will certainly never see a single dime from my side. I don’t even know how stupid their marketing department is to impose these limits on users instead of offering a valuable product to the paying faction. But they don’t. Even if you pay, you get something that is also available for free elsewhere.

    The algorithm has also become less and less savvy in terms of e.g. English/German translations. It used to be that the bot could sort of sense what you were trying to say and put it into different colloquialisms, which was even fun because it was like, “I know what you’re trying to say here, how about…” Now it’s in parts too stupid to translate the simplest sentences correctly, and the suggestions it makes are at times as moronic as those made by Google Translations.

    If this is a deep-learning AI that learns from users’ translations and the phrases they choose most often – which, by the way, is a valuable, moneys worthwhile contribution of every free user to this project: They invest their time and texts, thereby providing the necessary data for the AI to do the thing as nicely as they brag about it in the first place – alas, the more unprofessional users discovered the translator, the worse the language of this deep-learning bot has become, the greater the aggregate of linguistically illiterate users has become, and the worse the language of this deep-learning bot has become, as it now learns the drivel of every Tom, Dick and Harry out there, which is why I now get their Mickey Mouse language as suggestions: the inane language of people who can barely spell the alphabet, it seems.

    And as a thank you for our time and effort in helping them and their AI learn, they’ve lowered the limit from what was once 5,000 to now 1,500…? A big “fuck off” from here for that! Not a brass farthing from me for this attitude and behaviour, not in a hundred years.

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