Windows 11 just received improvements in testing to make its Copilot AI more useful with implementing changes in the actual OS environment – in other words, the features that we’re all waiting for.

Copilot has a pretty limited repertoire in terms of what the AI can do for manipulating Windows settings (as opposed to its standard tricks in terms of replying to queries, image creation and so forth).

However, the bag of settings tricks just got considerably heavier, with a raft of additions having just been made to preview build 26058 of Windows 11 (in the Canary and Dev testing channels).

That build was actually released a week ago, but Microsoft just ushered in these extra improvements as Neowin noticed.

So, what can Copilot do for you now? There are a number of important accessibility changes, so for example the AI can be instructed to turn on Narrator or Live Captions, or voice functionality (Voice Access or typing).

And you can get Copilot to take out the trash (empty the Recycle Bin), turn on battery saver mode, or even tell you the IP address of your device.

Here’s the full list of the new capabilities of Copilot when it comes to engaging with Windows settings:

• Ask for available wireless networks
• Ask for system or device information
• Ask for battery information
• Ask to clean storage
• Ask to empty Recycle Bin
• Ask to toggle Battery Saver
• Ask to show startup apps
• Ask for your IP address
• Ask for system, device, or storage information

And the new accessibility features are as follows:

• Ask to turn on Narrator
• Ask to open Voice Access
• Ask to turn on Magnifier
• Ask to change text size
• Ask to start Live Captions
• Ask to turn on high-contrast
• Ask to start voice typing

This expands on Copilot’s existing powers to tweaks settings, which already includes taking a screenshot, or changing between the dark and light themes, for example.

Analysis: Expansion pack

There are 16 new abilities introduced in testing here, which should be coming through to the finished version of Windows 11 soon enough. That more than doubles the existing abilities of Copilot at the moment – there are just 12 ways to operate Windows 11 settings via the AI right now – so it’s a welcome expansion.

At the same time, progress on this front feels rather sluggish, given that Copilot and more broadly AI is such a major focus for Microsoft, ever since Bing Chat burst onto the scene about a year ago.

Windows 11 users were sold Copilot partly on its features related to operating various settings and modes easily and conveniently, rather than having to dive into a search deep in the Settings app (or hunting elsewhere in the interface). And thus far, not a lot of capabilities have been added, really.

We’re hoping Microsoft will get its foot to the floor on this side of the Copilot experience later this year, with the Windows 11 24H2 update, but for now, a doubling of numbers is at least a sign of some decent forward momentum.

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Windows 11’s latest cumulative update comes with an odd bug, it seems, one that reportedly causes the taskbar to disappear – or rather, to become blank space.

The February patch (KB5034765) for Windows 11 23H2 (and 22H2) has seen a number of complaints from users who have witnessed their desktop being affected by this apparent glitch, which as you can imagine is pretty frustrating.

As Neowin flagged up, there are reports on Microsoft’s Feedback Hub and the Reddit mega-thread on said patch from folks who have been hit by this problem.

One Redditor wrote: “Yay, both my Win11 23h2 workstations have no taskbar after updates and a reboot... have to kill explorer and relaunch.”

Somebody replied to that: “This is happening to me as well I thought something broke, but removing KB5034765 resolved it for me. I don’t even see explorer.exe in my running tasks when that happened, though.”

There are a number of other reports, as mentioned, with those affected not able to launch their taskbar pinned apps (as the icons aren’t there, of course), or see the system tray, access Quick Settings and so on. The basic ability to see your running apps and switch between them on the bar is obviously missing in action, too.

Analysis: Have a little patience?

We should note that in the interest of balance, a lot of folks on that Reddit thread are saying they had no issues with KB5034765. It’s not clear how widespread the vanishing taskbar gremlin might be, and Microsoft has not acknowledged the problem yet in its known issues – but we get the feeling it has a limited impact, looking at the overall feedback on this patch.

As noted above, the only solution seems to be uninstalling the February cumulative update, which certainly works to return the taskbar to its normal state.

The slight twist here is that this problem has been seen before, and another Redditor offers up a theory as follows: “The taskbar missing thing is part of the EU policy updates. Taskbar is not showing for up to 10 minutes, it’s normal and has been in the Release Preview Channel for 2-3 months.”

This makes some sense, as there’s some heavy duty work on the taskbar going on with those EU regulation-related changes, like unhooking Bing from the search box on the bar.

So, in theory the taskbar may reappear soon after applying the update – maybe. But we presume given the number of affected folks, with no one else observing said reappearance that we can see, there could be more to this issue than merely this. Unless everyone hitting the snag is uninstalling KB5034765 pretty sharpish, which seems unlikely across the board.

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Speed running has long been a pursuit undertaken by gamers, but in more recent times we’ve seen some more left-field speedruns, and here’s another one: a super-quick installation of Windows 10.

Yes, you read that right, the challenge of installing the Microsoft operating system as fast as possible was taken on by NTDev, who is the developer of the lightweight version of Windows 10 known as Tiny10 (and its sibling version for Windows 11, named Tiny11 as you might guess).

NTDev managed to install their own version of Windows 10, meaning Tiny10, in just over 100 seconds, so not far off a minute and a half.

Pretty impressive? Yes, but there is a caveat, and it’s not a tiny one: the Tiny10 version used was an old and further modified installer which was optimized with speed running in mind.

In fact, the attempt was made using a Tiny10 install based on Windows 10 1809, which is the October 2018 Update.

Analysis: Rules of the game?

To be fair, a working version of Windows 10 was still installed – well, we assume – and the caveat of it being an old Tiny10 build, further tinkered with and streamlined to set up at lightning speed, isn’t really a criticism as such. Depending on how you look at things, anyway…

After all, a speed run which was just the standard install process, based on how fast you could click, would be deadly dull and pointless, of course. For us, the hacking away at the OS to run faster in setup is the speed running, in the same way that, for example, bouncing off walls or strafe running and so on is for gamers (and often finding weird glitches to exploit in one way or another).

As long as the Windows version that’s up and running actually functions, the speed run should count in our books. But, if we’re going to get serious for a moment, this does bring up complicated questions about what could be legitimately cut out, and what features must remain, if you wanted to standardize OS speed running rules in some way.

The other (perhaps simpler, but less fun arguably) route to go would be having a standard installation mandated, with no tweaking, so the skill would be in the hardware setup. However, even then, there would need to be rules on what setups and components were fair game. (Naturally NTDev tells us they were using the fastest storage and RAM they could get their hands on).

At any rate, this is an entertaining feat to watch, especially given that a typical Windows installation will probably eat around half an hour of your life (and most definitely isn’t something you’d want to watch). All that’s missing here, frankly, is a ‘Ride of the Valkyries’ soundtrack which surely should have been the choice of background music (not the feeble electronic beat supplied).

There’s also a recent Windows 11 speedrun from NTDev which is completed in a somewhat longer, but still impressive, three minutes (see above).

How long does it take you to install Windows 11? For us, it’s two-and-a-third years and counting (sorry Microsoft, couldn’t resist).

Via Tom's Hardware

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Windows 11’s next feature update, known as Moment 5, does indeed appear to be coming imminently – as was recently rumored – as a test build of the upgrade has just arrived in the Release Preview channel.

As you may be aware, that’s the final test channel before the release version of Windows 11 (as the name makes clear).

Preview build 22631 for Windows 11 23H2 (patch KB5034848) comes with a bunch of improvements, but not nearly the same quantity that’d normally be delivered by a Moment update – this is a relatively minor affair.

Build 22631 includes a shift for the Copilot button, which is moved to the right of the taskbar (into the system tray area, where the clock lives).

This preview also powers up the Snipping Tool so you can edit photos just taken on your Android smartphone on the desktop (for those who have their phone hooked up to Windows 11, of course).

There’s a raft of bug fixes here, too, plus other changes are coming courtesy of a separate February Windows Configuration Update (KB5035349) that’s being delivered at the same time. (Indeed, this will be installed simultaneously for some users – those who have the ‘get the latest updates’ toggle turned on).

The complementary KB5035349 includes a fair bit of work on a key accessibility feature, namely Voice Access, which is getting the ability to implement custom commands, and to open apps or interact with elements on the desktop. Also, those with multiple monitors can use Voice Access across all those displays, and it’s receiving bolstered support for additional languages too.

Elsewhere, there are small tweaks to improve the Nearby Share feature, and better transfer speeds when using it. Also, the Windows share panel now lets you share via WhatsApp (via the ‘Share using’ option).

Furthermore, the Snap Layouts feature now offers intelligent suggestions to give you quick and easy options for snapping windows together. That’ll be pretty handy for folks who use that part of the Windows 11 interface.

Analysis: Bigger changes are inbound, but not for most folks

There’s nothing that major here, then, and some previously rumored abilities (like being able to undock Copilot) don’t seem to have made the cut.

There are other big changes incorporated with Moment 5, but the catch is that they aren’t coming to US users – or other regions for that matter, they’re only being provided to those in Europe.

Specifically, Windows 11 users in the European Economic Area (EEA) will be treated to an extensive set of changes to some core features, all of which relate to complying with incoming regulations in the region (namely the Digital Markets Act).

That includes the ability to completely remove the Edge browser from Windows 11, and also to ditch Bing from the operating system’s search box in the taskbar. Options users in the US, and elsewhere, would like to benefit from in some cases, no doubt – but sadly, they won’t get the chance.

This represents the final testing phase of the Moment 5 update, and it fits with the previously rumored release timeframe (for the finished version) of late in February.

The caveat, mind you, is that this end-of-February update will be the optional release (still officially in preview), with the full rollout not starting until March (in the cumulative update for that month). As ever, this will be a phased rollout too, as Microsoft will be monitoring for problems that could crop up even with release software.

The big update for this year – for everyone around the globe – is, of course, Windows 11 24H2, which has now been confirmed by Microsoft (meaning it won’t be Windows 12, as some rumors previously suggested).

Via Neowin

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We're always keeping an eye on the early preview versions of Windows 11 to see what's coming down the pipe, and so we're pleased to see two small but useful fixes on the way that should be rolling out to everyone soon.

First up, at long last it looks as though Microsoft will add the option to hide the news feed from the widgets box. This has been enabled in build 26058 (via XDA Developers), so you can check up on the weather or sports scores without being bombarded by the latest headlines from across the web.

The new view is simply called My Widgets, and the thinking is that it may have been introduced in part to appease EU regulators – regulators who are keen to give users as much flexibility as possible. Based on the Dev and Canary channels of Windows 11 though, this tweak will be available worldwide.

You can access widgets by clicking the widgets icon on the taskbar. It should be to the left of the other icons, and might already be showing some dynamic information (like the weather or a traffic alert) – otherwise it's a white rectangle next to a blue rectangle.

Clearer cutting, copying, and pasting

Second, and sticking with Build 26058 (via MSPowerUser), Windows 11 is adding text labels to the cut, copy, and paste icons that appear when you right-click in File Explorer. If you've ever squinted at this pop-up menu to try and figure out exactly where to click, you'll know how useful these labels will be.

Of course, you can still use the familiar keyboard shortcuts if you prefer, but for those of us going through the context menus in File Explorer, this should make a significant difference – and avoid files being moved or copied to the wrong place.

For more details, you can check out Microsoft's blog post on the latest update. Other features to look out for include a new crosshairs mode for the cursor (see above), which is intended to help low vision users select items more accurately.

As always, Microsoft's plans can change, and features that appear in preview versions of Windows don't always make it out to everyone. However, these fixes seem to have a good chance of making it so we're looking forward to seeing them appear.

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Debloating Windows is quite the tradition among some users, and there are apps out there to make this task easier – and a new version of an existing client takes things further with the ability to strip out AI functionality from Windows 11 (and Windows 10, which also has Copilot).

This is BloatyNosy, an app that has been around for quite some time (it was previously known as ThisIsWin11). Now, there’s a fresh incarnation: BloatyNosyAI.

It’s the first version of the new take on the app – still in preview, officially – and the idea is that it can help ditch AI features from Windows 11.

Neowin spotted the launch and tried out BloatyNosyAI, which is handy as the app itself doesn’t make it clear exactly what it can do in terms of Windows 11 AI extraction on its GitHub page.

All the developer, Belim, observes is that the app offers the “ability to remove AI features in Windows” and that: “Plugins can be accessed, for example, via the keyword ‘Plugin’ or ‘AI’ to remove AI in Windows 11/10.”

Neowin tried those keywords – note that the app itself is AI-powered (ironically), which is what the name refers to, as well as debloating AI – and discovered options to remove the Copilot button from the taskbar, or to remove AI from the Edge browser.

The overall philosophy of BloatyNosy is suggested by the name; it’s not just about removing bloat from Windows and speeding it up a touch, but also tweaking privacy settings to combat Microsoft’s ‘nosier’ measures in the OS.

Analysis: Caution first

As already observed, we’d recommend being cautious with this one. It’s interesting to see the new angle and version of BloatyNosy here, but it is still a preview, and this kind of software can have unintended side effects. We’d avoid installing a preview update from Microsoft for Windows 11, let alone a third-party app, just because you never quite know what might go wrong with code that’s still in testing.

Especially when it’s messing around with the internals of Windows 11 (or Windows 10) and stripping out features.

It is, of course, possible to remove Copilot yourself as Neowin pointed out, but that involves fiddling around with the Registry, which is not a recommended pursuit for anyone except the highly tech-savvy.

There are measures you can take to minimize the appearance of Copilot in Windows 11, mind – such as turning off the taskbar icon for the AI, so at least you won’t see it. (Even if that’s hardly the same as removing the assistant from your desktop – or indeed your keyboard where it could set up home in the future).

For now, we’d treat this app purely as an emerging sign of the interest in banishing Copilot from Windows 11, as not everyone wants AI on their PC. Whether Microsoft itself will ever offer an option to strip out Copilot from Windows 11 completely (only available via a Registry hack currently, as mentioned), well, put it this way: we wouldn’t bank on it.

The good news is that Microsoft is making efforts to debloat Windows 11 in one way or another, to some extent, though.

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The Sticky Notes app for Windows is about to get possibly its most significant update yet. The default Windows app functions similarly to how most people use post-its in real life - you can quickly jot down notes and make them visible on your desktop. It’s been four years since we’ve seen any major updates to Sticky Notes, and Microsoft is promising that it’s got big things in mind for the handy app. 

The update was announced by the official Microsoft Sticky Notes account on X (formerly Twitter), the first post from the account since April 2020. The post generated buzz from users who quickly got to speculating about what Microsoft might be cooking, with many users being quick to express concern that the new Sticky Notes will be a web-based app.

Windows fans launch into speculation 

Some users guessed that the app was getting an AI-powered injection similar to those seen in apps like Notepad and Paint, and in line with Microsoft’s great AI-aided tool push. In fact, our own Muskaan Saxena wrote about her hopes for an AI-powered Sticky Notes app earlier this year. It looks like neither this nor the notion of a web-based version is the case, however, with the @stickynotes profile replying to its first announcement post that the Sticky Notes app will not be a web app (for now, at least).  

It then followed with a number of playful posts teasing users about the upcoming upgrade, including one that looks like a screen grab of the app that reads: 

“Lots of rumors swirling about our update. Can you guess what it is?

Wrong answers only. 

We’ll go first… 

Sticky Notes AI upgrade.” 

Right now, Sticky Notes seems to enjoy a good reputation among users and Windows fans - even if it does have a relatively basic feature set. Neowin says the app has “reliability and simplicity,” and Microsoft would do well to prioritize and preserve these aspects of the app.  

Microsoft's recent track record

Microsoft recently launched the new web-based Outlook app, replacing existing desktop apps like Mail, with a less-than-enthusiastic reception. Users have expressed their disappointment with the new Outlook app's feature-related shortcomings and its functioning as a powerful data harvester for Microsoft, as reported by Proton AG (a company offering online services with an emphasis on privacy). This recent Outlook-related news has users skeptical about future developments that come from Microsoft.

Fans and watchers of the Sticky Notes app are evidently open to seeing what Microsoft has in store, while not hiding their strong potential concerns, and Microsoft might just pull something truly impressive out of the bag. Some users have raised the question of whether Sticky Notes actually needs new and fancy features, but perhaps it’ll be easy enough to just not use whatever they don’t need.

Personally, I agree that an app like Sticky Notes might be best fit for purpose when kept simpler, and even if Microsoft adds features, there’s probably plenty of scope for development without needing to invoke AI. We’ll have to see just how exciting this upgrade is when it actually arrives, but till then, we’ll just have to wait and hope Microsoft hears the very much available user feedback.

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Windows 11’s big update for this year could come with an operating system-wide upscaling feature for PC games in the same vein as Nvidia DLSS or AMD FSR (or Intel XeSS).

The idea would be to get smoother frame rates by upscaling the game’s resolution. In other words, running at a lower resolution, and artificially ramping it up to a higher level of detail, but with a greater level of fluidity than running natively, all of which would be driven by AI.

The ‘Automatic Super Resolution’ option is currently hidden in test builds of Windows 11 (version 26052 to be precise). Leaker PhantomOfEarth enabled the feature and shared some screenshots of what it looks like in the Graphics panel in the Settings app.

There’s a system-wide toggle for Microsoft’s own take on AI upscaling, and per-app settings if you wish to be a bit more judicious about how the tech is applied.

In theory, this will be ushered in with Windows 11 24H2 – which is now confirmed by Microsoft as the major update for its desktop OS this year. (There’ll be no Windows 12 in 2024, as older rumors had suggested was a possibility).

We don’t know that Automatic Super Resolution will be in 24H2 for sure, though, as it could be intended for a later release, or indeed it might be a concept that’s scrapped during the testing process.

Analysis: Microsoft’s angle

This is still in its very early stages, of course – and not even officially in testing yet – so there are a lot of questions about how it will work.

In theory, it should be a widely applicable upscaling feature for games that leverages the power of AI, either via a Neural Processing Unit – the NPUs now included in Intel’s new Meteor Lake CPUs, or AMD’s Ryzen 8000 silicon – or the GPU itself (employing Nvidia’s Tensor cores, for example, which are used to drive its own DLSS).

As noted, though, we can’t be sure exactly how this will be applied, though it’s certainly a game-targeted feature – the text accompanying it tells us that much – likely to be used for older PC games, or those not supported by Nvidia DLSS, AMD FSR, or Intel XeSS for that matter.

We don’t expect Microsoft will try and butt heads with Nvidia in terms of attempting to outdo Team Green’s own upscaling, but rather supply a more broadly supported alternative, one which won’t be as good. The trade-off is that wider level of support, much as already seen with AMD’s Radeon Super Resolution (RSR), which is, in all likelihood, what this Windows 11 feature will resemble the most.

Outside of gaming, Automatic Super Resolution may also be applicable to videos, and perhaps other apps – video chatting, maybe, at a guess – to provide some AI supercharging for the provided footage.

Again, there are already features from Nvidia and AMD (the latter is still incoming) that do video upscaling, but again Microsoft would offer broader coverage (as the name suggests, Nvidia’s RTX Video Super Resolution is only supported by RTX graphics cards, so other GPUs are left out in the cold).

We expect Automatic Super Resolution is something Microsoft will certainly be looking to implement, more likely than not, to complement other OS-wide technologies for PC gamers. That includes Auto HDR, which brings HDR (or an approximation of it) to SDR games. (And funnily enough, it looks like Nvidia is working on its own take on that ability, building on RTX Video HDR which is already here for video playback).

As you may have noticed at this point, there are a lot of this kind of performance-enhancing technologies around these days, which is telling in itself. Perhaps part of Microsoft’s angle is a simple system-level switch that confused users can just turn on for upscaling trickery across the board, and ‘it just works’ to quote another famous tech giant.

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Remember that really strange bug where Windows 11 caused havoc with multi-monitor setups, shuffling desktop icons around, or even moving them onto different screens?

Well, the good news is Microsoft has now fixed this (but the not-so-great news is that it isn’t remedied for Windows 10 users, not yet – we’ll come back to that shortly).

Affected Windows 11 PCs were seeing icons being moved about on the desktop, or seemingly randomly shifted to their other monitors in a highly confusing fashion. Rather like the digital equivalent of a poltergeist possessing your system and causing mischief.

The problem was first spotted in Windows 11 back in November 2023, with the root cause being Copilot – and this led to Microsoft putting a block (a so-called compatibility hold) on rolling out the AI assistant to those with multiple monitors attached to their PC. (And furthermore, there was a block on the Windows 11 23H2 upgrade, for those who hadn’t yet migrated to that version – as it introduces Copilot).

However, all that’s now lifted as the issue has been resolved, as Neowin spotted.

Microsoft updated its known issues with Windows 23H2 (in the release health dashboard) to say that: “This issue was resolved on the service-side for Windows 11, version 23H2 and Windows 11, version 22H2 on devices with updates released January 9, 2024 or later. Non-managed consumer Windows devices with no other compatibility hold should now have Copilot for Windows available. The safeguard hold has been removed as of February 7, 2024.”

Analysis: Ghost in the machine

A service-side tweak means that Microsoft has applied the fix on its end, so there’s no actual update or tinkering that needs to happen with your Windows 11 PC. The fix is just there, and the compatibility hold on Windows 11 23H2 is lifted, so those who’ve been stuck without 23H2 or Copilot should now be able to upgrade just fine.

However, Microsoft observes that it may take up to 48 hours for 23H2 to be offered to your computer. Restarting the PC and manually checking for updates may help to prompt Windows to discover the upgrade.

This is true for Windows 11 PCs previously blocked from 23H2, and also Windows 10 users who wanted to upgrade their device to Windows 11 23H2. The twist here, though, is this icon-flinging bug isn’t actually resolved with Windows 10, if you want to stick with the older OS rather than migrate to Windows 11.

If you recall, Windows 10 users were also affected, and blocked from getting Copilot (when it was subsequently rolled out to them). And sadly, that’s still the case, so those with multiple monitors running Windows 10 still won’t get the AI assistant. With the problem solved in Windows 11, though, presumably it won’t be long before it’s also cured for those staying on Windows 10.

Microsoft updated the Windows 10 release health dashboard to note that: “We are working on a resolution for this issue on Windows 10, version 22H2 and will provide an update in an upcoming release.”

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Microsoft is trying out some interesting new changes in testing for Windows 11, including bolstering a pair of core apps for the OS – with one of them getting supercharged by AI.

Those two apps are Notepad and Snipping Tool, with new versions rolling out to testers who are in the Dev and Canary channels.

The big one is Notepad which is getting an infusion of AI in the form of an ‘Explain with Copilot’ option. This allows you to select any written content in Notepad and via the right-click menu (or Ctrl + E shortcut), summon Copilot to explain more about the selected text, as you might guess.

As Microsoft notes: “You can ask Copilot in Windows to help explain log files, code segments, or any selected content directly from within Notepad.”

This feature should be available to all testers in those earlier Windows Insider channels in version 11.2401.25.0 of Notepad, though Microsoft observes that some folks may not see it right away. (This is labeled as a ‘known issue’ so it’s seemingly a bug with the deployment).

What’s going on with Snipping Tool? Well, a previously leaked feature is now present in version 11.2401.32.0 in testing, namely the ability to annotate screenshots with shapes and arrows.

That’s pretty handy for composing screen grabs for the likes of instructional step-by-steps where you’ll be pointing out bits to the person following the guide.

Elsewhere in Windows 11 testing, the Beta channel has a new preview version, but there’s not all that much going on here. Build 22635.3140 does make a small but impactful change, though, for Copilot, moving the icon for the AI in the taskbar to the far right-hand side (into the system tray).

Microsoft observes that it makes more sense for the Copilot button to be on the right of the taskbar, given that the panel for the AI opens on the right, so it’ll be directly above the icon. It’s worth remembering that regarding the Copilot panel, Microsoft just made it larger, apparently as a result of feedback from users of the AI.

Analysis: Cowriter MIA?

Regarding that Beta channel tweak for the Copilot icon, that seems a fair enough adjustment to make. Although that said, rumor has it the next update for Windows 11 – which will be Moment 5 arriving later this month in theory – will allow for the ability to undock the AI so it isn’t anchored to the right side of the desktop. Still, that remains speculation for now, and even then there will be those folks who don’t undock Copilot, anyway.

As mentioned, the big testing move here is the new Notepad ability, and it’s no surprise to see more Windows 11 apps getting AI chops. The integration with Copilot here is on a pretty basic level, mind, compared to previous rumors about a fully-featured Cowriter assistant along the lines of the existing Cocreator in Paint. Still, it’s possible this is an initial move, and that a more in-depth Cowriter function could still turn up in the future at some point.

That said, Notepad is not supposed to be a complex app – the idea is it’s a lightweight and streamlined piece of software – so maybe further AI powers won’t be coming to the client.

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The Copilot panel in Windows 11 has been tinkered with a good deal in recent times, and a newer change that has been applied is one to switch up the way it appears by default, which has now been accompanied by a prompt from Microsoft explaining why.

This was spotted by regular leaker Leopeva64 on X (formerly Twitter), who noted that the Copilot pane is now wider than it used to be, and opens as an overlay, rather than in side-by-side view (a more compact form, where it’s always nestling next to your active window).

Leopeva64 explains that the Copilot interface has opened this way for a short while now, but a new addition is a prompt Microsoft has added to explain why.

The ‘What’s new’ pop-up tells us that the recent change to make the panel wider so there’s “more space to chat” was due to Windows 11 user feedback requesting that additional real-estate. It also notes, however, that there’s a button at the top of the panel you can click to switch back to the more compact side-by-side layout, if you wish.

Analysis: Copilot expansion

It’s useful to have an explanation of the recent move to change the default settings for how the AI opens, and by all accounts, this points to Windows 11 users favoring a larger Copilot panel. (Or at least some of them, and we could assume the majority, at least of those who’ve fed back to Microsoft on Copilot’s interface).

Certainly those who use Copilot quite a lot in Windows 11, engaging in longer sessions of queries, may welcome the AI assistant getting more screen space by default.

The truth is we can expect to see a lot more of Copilot, one way or another, going forward. By which we mean Microsoft is already testing the waters for having the AI assistant appear when Windows 11 first boots (in a limited fashion thus far, mind). Furthermore, there are clues that Copilot may be integrated into other parts of the Windows 11 interface (such as File Explorer). We can envisage further possibilities like being able to dock Copilot elsewhere (it sits on the right-hand side of the screen currently).

What we definitely don’t want to see are nudges or adverts to use Copilot, but sadly – yet somewhat predictably – this has been spotted in testing too (promoting Copilot Pro, the supercharged paid version of the AI, we should clarify).

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