Ever wanted to test your website in various versions of Internet Explorer?

It is possible to run Internet Explorer in standalone mode without having to over-write previous versions thanks to Joe Maddalone who came up with a way of achieving that in November 2003. Basically, Internet Explorer is run by exploiting a known workaround to DLL hell - which was introduced in Windows 2000 and later versions - called DLL redirection.

Manfred Staudinger perfected the standalone versions by adding IE version numbers to the title bar of the standalone browser window. Moreover, by removing the "IE" key in the registry subkey [HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Version Vector] Internet Explore defaulted to respecting conditional comments based on the version number prebuilt in the program.

It is not difficult to follow the instructions and get any version of IE running in standalone along side other versions. Most of you probably know of evolt's archive of Internet Explorer which has them readily packaged in ZIP files. Now suppose you want to download them all. An installer that would conveniently automate the whole process would be great. Thanks to this comment for the idea.

So I made an installer which contains IE3 IE4.01 IE5 IE5.5 and IE6

which, in the end , will conveniently create shortcuts based on your preferences

Important Notes:

• The installer was made to work with Windows XP. With a little bit of hacking it could run on Windows 2000 but this was not tested. See some of the comments below for ways to run Multiple IE on Windows 2000 (page 4).

• The Developer tool bar from Microsoft WILL NOT work in IE6

• Sometimes IE5, IE5.5 and IE6 crash unexpectedly. 

• Multiple IE doesn't work on Windows Vista. Follow the progress of running Internet Explorer 6 natively on Windows Vista here!
• Read the comments before asking questions. Most of the issues have been discussed below.

• Microsoft supplemental EULA says : IF YOU DO NOT HAVE A VALID EULA FOR ANY "OS PRODUCT", YOU ARE NOT AUTHORIZED TO INSTALL, COPY, OR OTHERWISE USE THE OS COMPONENTS AND YOU HAVE NO RIGHTS UNDER THIS SUPPLEMENTAL EULA.

• Update December 2007: A recent windows update broke the Multiple IE installation and unfortunately this means you'll have to reinstall Multiple IE to get it to work again. I haven't yet identified which update broke the installation.

• Run Internet Explorer 7.0 in standalone mode
• Internet Explorer 6 in Vista - Part 1