Turn a website into a Windows app: four routes compared

The fastest way to turn a website into a Windows app takes about ten seconds and needs no software. Open the site in Microsoft Edge, open the "Settings and more" menu, go to More tools, then Apps, and choose "Install this site as an app". The site gets its own window, its own taskbar icon and an entry in the Start menu. Chrome does the same thing under "Install page as app". That covers most people who searched this phrase. The rest want something different: a real .exe file they can hand to other people, or a way to keep a dozen web apps from drowning in browser tabs. Those are separate problems with separate tools, and mixing them up is how people end up paying for a build service when a menu item would have done the job. This guide walks through all four routes, checked against each vendor's own documentation on October 18, 2026.

Route 1: install the site from Microsoft Edge

Edge is already on every Windows 10 and Windows 11 machine, so it is the natural place to start. Microsoft's support article, Install, manage, or uninstall apps in Microsoft Edge, describes two cases.

If the site is a Progressive Web App (a site that ships a manifest and declares itself installable), Edge shows an "App available" icon in the address bar. Click it, then click Install.

If the site is not a PWA, it can still be installed:

1. Open the site in Edge.
2. Select Settings and more (the three dots in the top corner).
3. Choose More tools, then Apps, then Install this site as an app.
4. Confirm the name and click Install.

After that, everything happens on the edge://apps page. Each installed app gets a card with a Details button. From Details you can pin it to the taskbar, pin it to Start, create a desktop shortcut, or turn on Auto-start on device login so it opens when Windows starts. Uninstalling happens from the same card, with an option to delete the app's history and data.

Microsoft's developer documentation, Use Progressive Web Apps in Microsoft Edge, explains how far the integration goes. An installed PWA appears in the taskbar, in the Start menu and in the Alt+Tab switcher, and it can be removed from Windows Settings under "Add or remove programs" like any other program. It can also send notifications through the Windows notification system. The same page lists one known limitation: in FSLogix environments, which many companies use for virtual desktops, an installed PWA disappears after signing out and back in. If a work laptop runs on a virtual desktop and the installed app keeps vanishing, that is the likely reason.

Route 2: install the site from Chrome

Chrome offers the same idea with different menu names. The Google help page Use web apps gives these steps:

1. Open Chrome and go to the site.
2. At the top right, select More, then Cast, save, and share, then Install page as app...
3. On some sites, an Install icon appears at the right of the address bar instead.
4. Follow the on-screen prompt.

Installed apps are managed at chrome://apps. Right-click an app there to choose Create shortcut, which puts a launcher on the desktop or in a menu, or Launch at startup, which opens it when you sign in to Windows. Uninstalling is done from the app's own More menu, and Chrome offers a checkbox labeled "Also delete data from Chrome". That checkbox is a useful clue. The installed app lives inside the Chrome profile it came from, so it shares that profile's sign-ins. If you are signed in to one Google account in that profile, the installed Gmail app opens that same account.

Edge or Chrome: which one to use

For a single site, the result is nearly identical. The choice comes down to which browser holds the account you want the app to use. If your work Microsoft 365 account lives in Edge and your personal Google account lives in Chrome, install work tools from Edge and personal tools from Chrome. The installed app inherits the sign-in, so installing from the wrong browser means signing in all over again.

What an installed site can and cannot do

An installed web app feels like a program, but it is still the website running in the browser engine. It helps to know where the line is before relying on it.

Question	Installed web app (Edge or Chrome)	Packaged .exe (Electron, Tauri)
Own window and taskbar icon	Yes	Yes
Start menu entry, Alt+Tab, uninstall from Settings	Yes, per Microsoft's Edge docs	Yes
Works without the browser installed	No	Yes
Can be emailed or handed to a colleague as a file	No	Yes
Separate sign-in from the browser	No, shares the browser profile	Yes, its own storage
Updates	Automatic, it is the live site	You rebuild and ship
Cost	Free	Free tools, paid services exist

Offline support depends on the site. Chrome's help page notes that although web apps can work offline, some do not work completely without a connection. A site that was never built for offline use will show an error page when the network drops, installed or not.

The other limit is accounts. Because an installed app shares the browser profile, you cannot install Gmail twice and have each copy signed in to a different account. The second copy opens the same session. Getting around this means creating a second browser profile, installing the app again from inside it, and remembering which icon belongs to which profile.

Route 3: build a real .exe from a website

Sometimes an installed shortcut is not enough. A small business may want to give customers a downloadable app, or a team may want an internal tool that runs on machines where the browser is locked down. For that, the website has to be wrapped in a program of its own. There are three common ways to do it in 2026.

Pake: one command, small output

Pake is an open source command-line tool that turns any website into a desktop app for macOS, Windows and Linux. It is built on Tauri, which uses the operating system's own web renderer instead of bundling a copy of Chromium. The project's README says the installer is typically under 10 MB on disk, which it describes as nearly 20 times smaller than an Electron package. On October 18, 2026 the repository showed 62.1k stars and a GPL-3.0 license. It suits someone who is comfortable running a command in a terminal and wants a quick, light wrapper.

Tauri or Electron: build it properly

If the app needs features the website cannot provide, such as reading local files, running in the system tray, or talking to hardware, the route is a framework. Tauri lets you keep your existing web front end and write the native parts in Rust, and it states that an app can be as small as 600KB because it relies on the system web renderer. It builds for Linux, macOS, Windows, Android and iOS from one codebase. Electron bundles Chromium and Node.js, which makes apps larger but gives every user the same rendering engine. Both are free and open source. Both mean writing and maintaining code.

Nativefier: still recommended in old answers

Many forum threads and older tutorials still point to Nativefier. Its GitHub repository shows that the project was archived by its owner on September 29, 2023, is read-only, and carries the note "Nativefier is unmaintained". It still has 35.2k stars, which is why it keeps appearing in search results. For a new project, Pake is the closest replacement in spirit.

Route 4: pay a service to build and sign it

Packaging is only half the work of shipping a Windows app. The other half is code signing, so that Windows SmartScreen does not warn users, plus automatic updates and an installer. Services exist to handle that.

ToDesktop is aimed at teams shipping Electron apps. On October 18, 2026 its homepage listed an Essential plan at $100 per month, with 10,000 downloads per month, code signing, native installers and Windows, Mac and Linux build servers. The Performance plan was $300 per month and added MSI and PKG installers and Microsoft and Mac App Store support. All plans included a 7-day free trial, and yearly billing showed a 20% discount. ToDesktop also offers a separate product, ToDesktop Builder, for people who have a web app and do not want to write Electron code.

For sites that are already PWAs, PWABuilder describes itself as a way to publish a Progressive Web App to app stores, including the Microsoft Store. That route keeps the app as a live website while giving it a store listing.

These services make sense when the app is a product with users. For one person who wants a site in its own window, they cost far more than the problem is worth.

If the computer is a Mac

Many people who type "Windows app" are really asking for "a site in its own window", whatever the operating system. On a Mac the built-in route is Safari. Apple's support page Use Safari web apps on Mac explains that starting with macOS Sonoma 14, any webpage can be saved as a web app:

1. Open the page in Safari.
2. Choose File > Add to Dock, or click the Share button and choose Add to Dock.
3. Type a name and click Add.

The app is saved to the Applications folder inside your home folder and can be opened from the Dock or Spotlight. One difference from Edge and Chrome matters a lot. Apple states that a Safari web app shares no browsing history, cookies, website data or settings with Safari. That means a Safari web app has its own sign-in. You can keep a work Gmail in Safari and a personal Gmail in a Safari web app, and they stay apart. Web apps can also show an unread count on their Dock icon for sites that send notifications. Chrome's "Install page as app" works on macOS too, with the same profile-sharing behavior as on Windows.

When the real problem is too many web apps

Installing one site as an app solves one site. People who live in Gmail, Slack, Notion, a calendar and an AI assistant all day often install five or six of these and then find a new set of problems. Each one is a separate window to find. Notifications arrive from several places. And two accounts on the same service still need two browser profiles.

A different kind of tool targets that situation: an app aggregation browser, which keeps every web app in one window with a sidebar and gives each app its own sign-in storage. One macOS example gives each app its own cookie container, so three Gmail accounts can stay signed in side by side, and gathers notifications from every app into one place, as listed on its Features page. Its free plan covers one workspace with up to three apps. This is a Mac answer, not a Windows one, so it only helps if the work happens on a Mac.

What to change first

Count the sites you want as apps. If it is one or two, install them from Edge or Chrome today and pin them to the taskbar. If you need a file to give to other people, start with Pake, and move to Tauri or a paid build service only when signing and updates become a real cost. If you are on a Mac and the problem is many apps and many accounts, look at a browser built for that, such as SpaceDeck.