The latest version of Internet Explorer Mobile includes tabbed browsing. The browser supports multi-touch gestures, including pinch-to-zoom as well as tap-to-zoom, although not the at present. Bing Search is tightly integrated with Internet Explorer Mobile. It can display websites in both "mobile" and "desktop" versions.
Pocket Internet Explorer was first introduced in Windows CE 1.0, released in November 1996. It does not derive from the Internet Explorer code and was written from scratch for being as lightweight as possible. PIE 1.1 was later released that supported cookies, HTTPS, and SSL.
Version 2 and 3
Pocket Internet Explorer 2.0, released in September 1997 with Windows CE 2.0, added many new features: offline browsing, resizing images to fit to screen, and richer HTML support, including framesets and tables. PIE 3.0, introduced in July 1998 with Windows CE 2.10, added support for JScript and various secure protocols.
Version 4
Pocket Internet Explorer 4 was the first to support ActiveX, CSS, VBScript as well as further extending support for HTTPS and advanced HTML features. Pocket PC 2002 version of PIE brought limited support for DHTML and XML, and also the ability to browse WAP sites – a feature not present in Internet Explorer for PC, Internet Explorer 6.0 added support for IFrames. The web browser supports FTP, XSLT, cookies and animated GIFs among other features.
Internet Explorer Mobile
Version 6
On July 8, 2008 at the annual Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference, Microsoft announced Internet Explorer Mobile 6 for their next version of Windows Mobile. Andy Lees, Microsoft's senior vice president of mobile communications business, said that Internet Explorer Mobile 6 was going to be a full version of Internet Explorer 6 on Windows Mobile. It was shown running briefly during Microsoft's 2009 CES Keynote on a Palm Treo Pro, and again in an official video for Toshiba's TG01 phone, which has a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor. Internet Explorer Mobile 6 was released as part of Windows Mobile 6.1.4, and some OEMs also installed it on Windows Mobile 6.1.4 Standard devices. New features include enhanced Javascript and AJAX support and support for Adobe Flash Lite 3.1. The browser also has a redesigned finger friendly Graphical user interface. Overall rendering quality and speed are also improved with this version; however according to Gizmodo and Engadget it didn't render pages as well as Opera Mobile and browsers based on Webkit.
Version 7
On February 15, 2010 Microsoft unveiled its next-generation mobile operating system, Windows Phone. With it, came a new version of the Internet Explorer Mobile browser. New features for the browser included multi-touch gesture support, tabbed browsing, a new UI, smooth zoom in/out animations, and a hybrid rendering engine of the Internet Explorer 7 and Internet Explorer 8 desktop versions. According to Engadget and Gizmodo, rendering speed and quality has significantly improved and was now on par with those of competing mobile browsers based on WebKit.
Version 9
At Mobile World Congress 2011 in February, 2011, Microsoft unveiled a major upgrade to Internet Explorer Mobile based on the rendering engine of Internet Explorer 9. Like its desktop counterpart, the browser features full hardware acceleration. Changes in this version included moving the address bar to the bottom of the screen and having it present in landscape orientation. Microsoft showed a number of HTML5 demonstrations for the browser. This is the last version supported on Windows Phone 7.
Version 10
In the Windows Phone Developer Summit in June 2012, Microsoft revealed that the next version of Windows Phone, Windows Phone 8, will come with the same web browsing engine to be used in Windows 8 PCs and tablets. IE10 Mobile will be faster and more secure, with advanced anti-phishing features like SmartScreen Filter to block dangerous websites and malware. With the help of shared core between IE10 Desktop and IE10 Mobile, Internet Explorer 10 Mobile supports a broader range of the HTML5 capabilities and boosts applications/websites' performance. When it finally came out IE10 Mobile out-performed the Galaxy S III, HTC One S, and iPhone 4S on iOS 6 Beta in the SunSpider benchmark.
Version 11
On July 15, 2014, Microsoft released Windows Phone 8.1, which includes the new Internet Explorer Mobile 11 browser. This version gets even closer to the desktop counterpart, by carrying over many of its improvements. New features include:
the possibility to swipe left or right to navigate to the previous or next webpage;
file upload;
a new HTML5 video web player with support for inline playback and closed captions;
Windows 8-style website live tiles;
the ability to save passwords;
the ability to open an unlimited number of tabs.
Furthermore, the button to refresh the page is now placed on the address bar, and the open tabs can be displayed on other Microsoft devices besides the smartphone in use: if a user is logged in with his Microsoft account on both his Windows 8.1 device and Windows Phone device, tabs on Internet Explorer 11 will synchronize automatically.
Version 11 Update
Microsoft made several changes to Internet Explorer Mobile to make the browser more compatible with sites designed for mobile Safari and Chrome. To accomplish this, Microsoft adopted features used in Safari and Chrome, emulates legacy WebKit features, and claims to web servers that it is iOS or Android compatible. The new version of Internet Explorer Mobile was released with Windows Phone 8.1 Update.
