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I have Internet Explorer installed on my computer but needed to test compatibility mode of IE 7. After changing the document mode to IE 7, it set it as default and now I can't change it. The default is stuck on IE 7?

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How do I set Document mode default?

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    I've a same problem now, but after resetting the IE, it still points to 7 as default. Is there any thing you tried to make it work?
    – Ashwath
    Commented Jan 8, 2015 at 9:04
  • let me know how to changing the document mode to IE 7 as default.
    – AKZap
    Commented Jan 13, 2015 at 11:30

8 Answers 8

Reset to default
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+50

The rendering mode in Internet Explorer 11 can appear stuck if the site is added to your local Compatibility View list. When this happens, the rendering mode inside the developer tools and out will default to the specified compatibility settings.

While this may not be the only way a site can get on this list, Microsoft does document the steps for how to manually add a site to this list.

From Fix site display problems with Compatibility View:

To add a site to the Compatibility View list

  1. Open the desktop, and then tap or click the Internet Explorer icon on the taskbar.

  2. Tap or click the Tools button, and then tap or click Compatibility View settings.

  3. Under Add this website, enter the URL of the site you want to add to the list, and then tap or click Add.

Site Compatibility View Removal Instructions:

To remove a site from this list, follow these instructions.

  1. Go to Tools > Compatibility View settings.
  2. In the resulting dialog, click on the site you want to remove from the list.
  3. Click the Remove button.

Screenshots:

Tools - Compatibility View settings

Compatibility View settings dialog

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    What worked for me was, in the last image, clear off the checkbox "Display intranet sites in Compatibility View". But still looking to set that programmatically, as intranet users may or may not be able to update such settings.
    – j4v1
    Commented Feb 11, 2016 at 13:27
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    Unchecked the Checkbox "Display intranet sites in Compatibility View" worked for me.
    – Dextere
    Commented Jun 3, 2016 at 21:23
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You can achieve this using a meta tag as follows:

<meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=edge,chrome=1" />
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    Looks like the tag didn't show - meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=edge,chrome=1"
    – Ken Gray
    Commented Jan 20, 2015 at 22:03
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    Why is there chrome=1 in there? Does chrome support/need this meta tag?
    – Omri Luzon
    Commented Sep 11, 2017 at 10:56
  • @OmriLuzon chrome=1 specifies that Google Chrome frame should start if the user has it installed. IE11 has IE=edge as default. Most won't have chrome frame anymore unless your users have <IE11
    – darcher
    Commented Apr 10, 2019 at 22:17
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I ran into this problem with a particular webpage I was maintaining. No matter what settings I changed, it kept going back to IE8 compatibility mode.

It turned out X-UA-Compatible was set in the metadata in the head:

<meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=8" >

As I later discovered, and at least in Internet Explorer 11, you can see where it gets its "document mode" from, by going into developer tools (F12), then selecting the tab "Emulation", and checking the text below the drop down "Document mode".

Since we only support IE11 and higher, and Microsoft says document modes are deprecated, I just threw the whole thing out. That solved it.

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I was having the same problem while developing my own website. While it was resident locally, resources opened as file//. For pages from the internet, including my own loaded as http://, the F12 Developer did use Edge as default, but not while they were loaded into IE11 from local files.

After following the suggestions above, I unchecked the box for "Display intranet Sites in Compatibility View".

That did the trick without adding any extra coding to my web page, or adding a multitude of pages to populate the list. Now all local files open in Edge document mode with F12.

So if you are referring to using F12 for locally hosted files, this may help.

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unchecked the "Automatically detect settings" in the Local Area Network Settings (found in "Internet Options" > Connections > LAN Settings.

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try to add this section in your web.config file on web server, sometimes it happens with php pages:

<httpProtocol>
    <customHeaders>
        <clear />
        <add name="X-UA-Compatible" value="IE=edge" />
    </customHeaders>
</httpProtocol>
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I've come across this problem myself. In my case, resetting IE was the quickest solution to the problem:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/923737

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    I've used the Fix it by Microsoft to reset the IE, by using the above URL, I closed IE and reopened it. but still it shows 7 as default, any idea?
    – Ashwath
    Commented Jan 8, 2015 at 9:07
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    Resetting IE completely loses all other settings in a non-reversible way, according to that link. Not quite a solution
    – David Crookes
    Commented Feb 3, 2015 at 9:08
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We may need to delete the REG_DWORD value for iexplore.exe under the registry editor to modify and change the default document mode to Edge or IE11.

Open the registry editor using regedit.exe and follow the below mentioned paths to find the configuration in registry.

For 32 bit windows machine: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE > SOFTWARE > Microsoft > Internet Explorer > Main > FeatureControl > FEATURE_BROWSER_EMULATION

For 64 bit windows machine: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE > SOFTWARE > Microsoft > Internet Explorer > Main > FeatureControl > FEATURE_BROWSER_EMULATION and HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE > SOFTWARE > WOW6432Node > Microsoft > Internet Explorer > Main > FeatureControl > FEATURE_BROWSER_EMULATION

Delete the REG_DWORD value iexplore.exe. Now close the browser and relaunch the website using Internet Explorer 11, it will default to Edge as Document Mode.

Ref: https://www.ibm.com/support/pages/ie11-document-mode-defaults-ie7-how-reset

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