Microsoft plans to unveil the design of Internet Explorer 9 next week, but thanks to a new leak, we now have a pretty good idea of what the next generation of Microsoft’s browser will look like. Currently, Microsoft only offers “developer preview” versions of the browser that do not feature the new user interface. The enterprising Internet Explorer 9 fans at IEBest.com, however, managed to get an early copy of the browser and captured the new interface on video.
The first images of Internet Explorer 9 leaked last month and today’s video confirms that Microsoft will likely use the stripped down, minimalist interface we saw in these leaked screenshots. As we noted last month, it looks like Microsoft has done away with the menu buttons and freed up even more space by combining the URL bar and tab bar into a single toolbar. While this frees up more space for displaying websites, it remains to be seen how effective this new layout will be when more than four or five tabs are open at the same time.
According to this new video, Internet Explorer 9 now also scores 95 out of 100 possible points on the Acid3 test, which measures how well the browser conforms to a specific set of web standards.
After looking at this video, do you think you will give Internet Explorer another try?
