Xbox browser allows players to use competitor services

Shortly after the release of the Xbox Series X|S it was discovered that emulators could be installed on it, and they actually worked.

Now, with a new update coming to upgrade the Microsoft Edge browser on the Xbox One and Series X|S, players will be able to use the service of Microsoft's own competitor, Google Stadia.

Stadia On Xbox

As first reported by The Verge, the new Chromium powered Edge browser is currently available to members of the Xbox Alpha Skip Ahead program.

The new browser still doesn't offer full keyboard and mouse support and still has some issues to iron out, but overall it is said to be a huge improvement from the currently available browser.

The new Chromium browser makes it possible to run streaming services directly from the browser, which includes Google Stadia and Amazon's Luna service.

This means that the Xbox players can now play games from one of their competitors directly from the Xbox.

Microsoft hasn't done anything to stop players from using emulators on their consoles, so it is possible that they won't do anything with this new discovery, although this has the potential to hurt their bottom line a little bit, due to many games on the service being available on Xbox too.

The good news, for Microsoft at least, is that Stadia isn't very popular and doesn't have a large userbase, so the impact should be minimal, especially considering only a small amount of Stadia players will own an Xbox and even less will know that it can be played on Xbox.

It is also possible that Microsoft will update its new Edge browser to prevent the services from being accessed.

Microsoft also recently launched its own cloud-based gaming as part of Game Pass Ultimate.

Currently, it is only available on mobile devices, but it due to get browser support at some point during Spring 2021.

In theory, the new Edge browser would be able to run it and would mean that players wouldn't need to wait for games to install from Game Pass and could instead just play them instantly directly from the cloud.