Two-octave spanning supercontinuum from a 4.53 µm fiber-based laser

•180 fs solitonic pulses at 4530 nm with tens of kilowatts peak power are generated in fluoride fibers.•The all fiber cascaded system provides the broadest femtosecond mid-infrared supercontinuum generated to date.•The reported brightness is three orders of magnitude larger than that of third generation synchrotron radiation sources.•The high temporal coherence of the pump source will be instrumental in the development of coherent mid-infrared continuum. We report on the generation of two-octave mid-infrared supercontinuum in stock, unprocessed, large core chalcogenide fiber pumped by a fiber-based laser delivering 35 kW, 180 fs pulses at 4.53 μm.