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Trident testing
Test your Office Add-in on the Trident webview associated with Internet Explorer 11.
07/14/2024
medium

Test your Office Add-in on Trident

If you plan to support older versions of Windows and Office, your add-in must work in the embeddable browser control called "Trident" that's provided by Internet Explorer 11. You can use a command line to switch from a more modern webview used by add-ins to Trident for this testing. For information about which versions of Windows and Office use the Internet Explorer 11 webview control, see Browsers and webview controls used by Office Add-ins. In this article, "webview" refers to the combination of a webview control and a JavaScript engine.

Important

Webviews from Internet Explorer and Microsoft Edge Legacy are still used in Office Add-ins

Some combinations of platforms and Office versions, including volume-licensed perpetual versions through Office 2019, still use the webview controls that come with Internet Explorer 11 (called "Trident") and Microsoft Edge Legacy (called "EdgeHTML") to host add-ins, as explained in Browsers and webview controls used by Office Add-ins. Internet Explorer 11 was disabled in Windows 10 and Windows 11 in February 2023, and the UI for launching it was removed; but it's still installed on with those operating systems. So, Trident and other functionality from Internet Explorer can still be called programmatically by Office.

We recommend (but don't require) that you support these combinations, at least in a minimal way, by providing users of your add-in a graceful failure message when your add-in is launched in these webviews. Keep these additional points in mind:

  • Office on the web no longer opens in Internet Explorer or Microsoft Edge Legacy. Consequently, AppSource doesn't test add-ins in Office on the web on these browsers.
  • AppSource still tests for combinations of platform and Office desktop versions that use Trident or EdgeHTML. However, it only issues a warning when the add-in doesn't support these webviews; the add-in isn't rejected by AppSource.
  • The Script Lab tool no longer supports Trident.

If you plan to support older versions of Windows and Office, your add-in must work in the embeddable browser control called "Trident" that's provided by Internet Explorer 11. You can use a command line to switch from a more modern webview used by add-ins to Trident for this testing. For information about which versions of Windows and Office use the Internet Explorer 11 webview control, see Browsers and webview controls used by Office Add-ins.

Important

Trident doesn't support JavaScript versions later than ES5. If you want to use the syntax and features of ECMAScript 2015 or later, you have to use a transpiler or polyfill or both. For more information about these options, see Support older Microsoft webviews and Office versions.

Also, Trident doesn't support some HTML5 features such as media, recording, and location. To learn more, see Determine the webview the add-in is running in at runtime.

Note

  • Office on the web can't be opened in Internet Explorer 11, so you can't (and don't need to) test your add-in on Office on the web with Internet Explorer.

  • Internet Explorer's Enhanced Security Configuration (ESC) must be turned off for Office Web Add-ins to work. If you're using a Windows Server computer as your client when developing add-ins, note that ESC is turned on by default in Windows Server.

Switch to the Trident webview

Tip

[!INCLUDEIdentify the webview through the add-in UI]

There are two ways to switch the Trident webview. You can run a simple command in a command prompt, or you can install a version of Office that uses Trident by default. We recommend the first method, but you should use the second in the following scenarios.

  • Your project was developed with Visual Studio and IIS. It isn't Node.js based.
  • You want to be absolutely robust in your testing.
  • You can't use the Beta channel for Microsoft 365 on your development computer.
  • You're developing on a Mac.
  • If for any reason the command line tool doesn't work.

Switch via the command line

[!INCLUDE Steps to switch browsers with the command line tool]

Install a version of Office that uses Internet Explorer

[!INCLUDE Steps to install Office that uses Edge Legacy or Internet Explorer]

See also