Note this method works on just about every version of Safari on every version of MacOS or Mac OS X, there are no modern version limitations on this trick to pose the Mac as a Windows PC with Internet Explorer.
Nonetheless there are many other options that let you get Internet Explorer access on a Mac, or even run Windows with IE or Microsoft Edge browser directly in Mac OS. Yes, though the above User Agent method is the easiest and least time consuming to setup. Are there other ways to get Internet Explorer on a Mac or access Windows PC-only websites on Mac? Just remember to set your Safari user agent back to the default setting again once you are finished accessing the Internet Explorer only website on the Mac.
When you have activated the “Internet Explorer” user agent on a Mac, then the Mac sends the message to web servers that the Mac is actually a Windows PC with Internet Explorer, as you can see in the user agent string reported back:Īnd once you switch back to the Safari or Default user agent string, you can also use Google search for “check user agent” to find that the Mac and Safari (webkit) user agent is detected again. You can see how this works yourself by going to Google and typing “check user agent’ into the search box and searching, where Google will report to you what your browser user agent is. Web developers use this functionality frequently for compatibility testing, but it has many other applications for accessing PC only and Internet Explorer only websites from a Mac, like some banking sites and bureaucratic websites, or various other websites that limit access to Windows PC and Internet Explorer. That’s all there is to it! How this trick works is that it changes what’s known as the User Agent identifier of the Safari and Mac web browser, fooling the target website into thinking your Mac is a Windows PC with Internet Explorer instead.