The answer is legal and logistical. Microsoft cannot redistribute Google Chrome's DLLs inside their OS kernel tools due to licensing. Furthermore, the Windows API ( IWebBrowser2 ) is a COM interface that is guaranteed to exist on every Windows machine (until recently). For a systems tool, using the OS intrinsic component is the safest bet for "it just works."
Until then, IE may be dead on the desktop, but it lives on forever in your CI/CD pipeline. Have you seen this error in a strange place? Did the registry hack work for you? Let me know in the comments below.
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DISM /Online /Add-Capability /CapabilityName:Browser.InternetExplorer~~~~0.0.11.0 If you are maintaining an internal tool, check if Microsoft released an update. Many tools that required uv (like older Visual Studio 2017 installers) have been patched to use the Edge WebView2 runtime instead. Upgrade your build tools if possible. The "Why not Chrome?" Question A reader might ask: "Why does Microsoft software depend on Microsoft IE instead of Google Chrome?"