Windows Latest

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It looks like Microsoft built a dedicated optional app that forces Bing everywhere on Windows 11, including Chrome, Firefox, and Brave. It's not being rolled out to users, and it's not enabled by default, but it's quite interesting that the company built something like this. The app is called Microsoft Recommended Search Settings, and it changes the default search engine to Bing in all browsers (Chrome, Firefox, and Brave). You also get redirected to the Microsoft Rewards page after the extension is installed, which is another smart move because it encourages you to keep using Microsoft's services and earn points 😁 Microsoft also developed a "fight back" mechanism, so if Chrome blocks the extension from changing your settings with a pop-up asking you to take action, Microsoft shows another pop-up beneath Chrome's, asking you not to listen to Google. We don't know why Microsoft built a dedicated app to change the default search engine on Windows 11, but it's not being rolled o

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2 days

Why was Pinball removed with Windows Vista? Turns out it wasn’t because of licensing. In 2007, when Microsoft released the beautiful Windows Vista, it dropped one of Windows XP’s most nostalgic built-in games: 3D Pinball for Windows - -Space Cadet. For years, people speculated that Pinball disappeared because of legal or licensing issues. But according to Microsoft, that was not the reason! Microsoft explained that during the Windows XP 64-bit porting effort, Microsoft had to move millions of lines of code from 32-bit to 64-bit Windows. Pinball was one of the apps that caused trouble. The 64-bit version had a bizarre bug where the ball would pass straight through objects, including the plunger and the table itself. “Games tended to be really short.” - MS The real problem was that Pinball’s code had been written years earlier by an outside company, and nobody at Microsoft properly understood how it worked anymore. MS couldn’t even find the collision detector, let alone fix t

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2 days

Windows 11 will let you decide how much memory goes to graphics and AI on PCs with unified memory, and it’s a big deal: windowslatest.com/2026/08/21/win… Based on internal Nvidia docs and a hidden Windows 11 feature called IntelligentCarveout, the idea points to a feature where you can configure “Reserved memory for accelerators,” “Memory for graphics and AI acceleration,” and an option to let Windows reserve additional unified memory for graphics and AI-intensive apps. This is being implemented because the next wave of Windows PCs is no longer just normal CPU + GPU + VRAM hardware. NVIDIA RTX Spark, AMD Ryzen AI Max, and other upcoming platforms are moving toward large shared memory pools where the CPU, GPU, and accelerators can all pull from the same high-bandwidth memory. RTX Spark can go up to 128GB of unified memory, which is exactly the kind of thing local AI models need. Windows 11 will give you greater control over systems with unified memory, and it will roll out la

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3 days

0:06

Microsoft has finally admitted that Windows 11’s right-click menu became “cluttered and sluggish,” which is funny because the entire point of the Windows 11 menu in 2021 was to fix Windows 10’s cluttered and sluggish right-click menu. Five years later, Microsoft is redoing the right-click menu, and the good news is that this one actually looks great. Windows 11 Build 26340.9212 has a redesigned File Explorer context menu that is faster, shorter, cleaner, and finally customizable. You can now decide which built-in actions appear, whether app extensions show directly in the menu or inside a submenu, and even whether Cut, Copy, Rename, Share, and Delete appear as the Windows 11 icon row or a more traditional vertical list. The old menu was slow enough that items could load after the menu opened, shifting the cursor and causing misclicks. The new one feels instant even on low-end hardware in our testing, and it feels better than Windows 10’s context menu now.

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5 days

Linux's usage is booming... but on Windows 11, thanks to Microsoft's WSL, Canonical’s VP of Engineering has officially admitted it. Canonical's VP says Ubuntu is now growing significantly faster inside Windows Subsystem for Linux than on native desktop installs. “In a year, the growth in our WSL numbers is significantly higher than the growth in Desktop usage numbers.” “I expect to see more Ubuntu WSL users than ‘native’ Ubuntu users over the coming months.” Microsoft built WSL so developers could use Linux without leaving Windows. Now a growing number of Windows PCs are basically Linux development machines with Windows acting as the desktop, launcher, enterprise management layer, and app compatibility shell. As we approach 2027, I think the old Windows vs Linux war is over. You can use Windows and Linux together and get the best out of the two worlds!

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1 wk

Microsoft is FINALLY adding the ability to customize the right-click menu in Windows 11, and here's a closer look. Say goodbye to cluttered menus that can take up your screen space even when you don't use most of the options. You can now turn options on or off in the context menu, which appears when you right-click anywhere in Windows 11, including File Explorer. This is a huge change, and it confirms Microsoft is really listening to all your feedback. Windows 11's customize menu feature for the context menu will begin rolling out to everyone in the coming months, and you'll be able to beta test it later this month.

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1 wk

0:11

Microsoft is cooking! Windows 11’s faster app launches released today, and everything is noticeably faster on low-end PCs. Windows 11’s CPU boost feature is no longer just for Start, Search, and shell flyouts. After installing the August 2026 security update, it is now silently active while opening apps too. We tested this on the same PC before and after KB5121003, and the difference is real. Notepad, Calculator, Chrome, VLC, PowerPoint, Weather, and even the Epic Games Store now trigger the same Low Latency Profile behavior Microsoft first rolled out for the Windows shell in June. The moment you open an app, Windows briefly pushes the CPU close to its maximum frequency for one to three seconds, finishes the launch work faster, and then drops back to idle. This is called “race to sleep,” and it is not a lazy trick. macOS and Linux already do similar things. CPU utilization does not spike the same way, so this is not your PC suddenly working harder forever. It is a short frequ

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1 wk

5 years later, Windows 10 refuses to die, and Microsoft just can’t push holdouts to Windows 11 The funny part is that Windows 10 holdouts don’t see it as a sinking ship in the first place. New enterprise PC data shows Windows 10 still runs on about 17% of Windows clients, while Windows 11 is at 78.8%. That means roughly one in six enterprise Windows PCs is still on Windows 10, even after the end-of-support deadline already forced the easy migrations. HP told investors the same story from another angle: roughly 30% of its installed PC base is still on Windows 10. Microsoft also basically admitted the Windows 11 sales boost from the Windows 10 end-of-support deadline is fading, with Windows OEM revenue down 5% after last year benefited from the support deadline. Everything appears to suggest that Windows 10 holdouts are not going to abandon the ship, and that explains why Microsoft extended the support for another year. Windows 10 still refuses to die.

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1 wk

Microsoft reveals why Windows 11 won’t get Liquid Glass-style UI, even though Windows Vista did it first with Aero. Microsoft’s design team has confirmed there are no “immediate changes” planned for the transparency options already in Windows. The reason is partly usability and accessibility, and partly because Microsoft looks at what the community is already providing through tools like Windhawk. That’s fair, but also a little funny, because Windows basically did this first. Vista’s Aero Glass had the frosted glass look back in 2007, long before Apple turned Liquid Glass into its new design language. Today, if you want that look on Windows 11, you need third-party mods. Windhawk can make Start, taskbar, notifications, and other shell surfaces look far closer to Apple’s Liquid Glass than Microsoft’s own settings allow. I get why people want it. Windows 11 still feels too visually conservative in places, and customization has always been one of the strongest arguments for usin

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2 wks

Windows 11's built-in Weather app should not be using over 1GB of RAM just to show me whether it will rain. I opened Weather during heavy rain because my phone was charging. The forecast itself was good: radar, hourly precipitation, wind, AQI, moon phase, severe alerts, the works. But Task Manager showed the app climbing past 1.2GB RAM without me doing anything serious. Then I expanded the process tree, and the reason became obvious. Weather is not really a native Windows app. It is MSN Weather running as a WebView2/Chromium wrapper with multiple browser-like processes under it. And yes, it also shows ads. A default Weather app on a paid operating system should not feel like an MSN page wearing a forecast icon. Apple’s Weather app on macOS gives detailed weather data without ads and used about 247MB of RAM in my comparison. Windows Weather used nearly five times that. I hope Microsoft's leadership does something about the inbox apps. BRING BACK NATIVE APPS

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2 wks

Breaking: Microsoft confirms it accidentally released "OneDrive Photos" to Windows 11 PCs more broadly than it should have. This explains why the app also showed up on enterprise PCs, where it does not work, as it only works with a Microsoft account (personal). As Windows Latest first reported, IT admins are fuming because they cannot remove OneDrive Photos without deleting the OneDrive sync client. Microsoft says it's working on a fix, and it'll be more careful next time. OneDrive Photos comes with a "People" feature, which uses AI to group similar faces, but Microsoft insists it's not training its AI models on your faces. This feature is also turned off by default. If you don't want the OneDrive Photos app to pop up on your PC in the coming days, remove all OneDrive-related features/apps. Microsoft has promised it'll soon let you remove "OneDrive Photos" without removing the OneDrive sync client.

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2 wks

Windows 11 is getting faster and dropping ads, and some changes are already rolling out! After years of users saying Windows 11 feels heavier than it should, Microsoft’s Scott Hanselman was asked a simple question on X: “Can’t you guys just make Windows run faster?” His reply was two words: “Yep. On it.” It lines up with everything Microsoft has been quietly doing this year. The company has already started rolling out Low Latency Profile to make Start, Search, and shell interactions respond faster, and it has confirmed memory optimization for PCs with 8GB RAM and above by the end of 2026. Windows 11 is optimizing for less RAM usage, faster File Explorer, faster Search, better WinUI performance, fewer WebView2-heavy experiences, less MSN junk, fewer ads, cleaner Widgets, and less Copilot forced into inbox apps. The year really belongs to Windows 11, and Microsoft is just getting started! List of all the changes rolling out right now, and coming in the next few weeks: wind

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2 wks

Windows 11 users were right about Modern Standby, and Microsoft is fixing it with a new policy. Microsoft is hoping to fix one of the most annoying problems on Windows laptops, and that is battery drain while "sleeping." Microsoft is testing a new adaptive hibernate policy that changes how your laptop behaves depending on battery level. If the battery is above 80%, Windows avoids hibernating as aggressively, so you still get fast instant-on resume from Modern Standby. But if the battery drops below 10%, Windows hibernates sooner to preserve power and stop the laptop from quietly dying in your bag. Modern Standby was supposed to be a great idea, but it has been frustrating, as it tries to wake up your PC like a phone, but a bad driver or background process can keep parts of the system active, and your “sleeping” laptop wakes up warm with 15% less battery. Microsoft has been fixing this from multiple angles: - fewer unexpected wake-ups - stricter behavior during sleep - be

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2 wks

Microsoft has quietly deleted multiple marketing documents where it pushed 32GB RAM for Windows 11 PCs. For the past year, Microsoft kept pushing the idea that 16GB was the baseline and 32GB was the “no-worries” zone. Then RAM prices exploded, PC shipments declined, Windows 10 refused to die, and Microsoft started selling new 8GB Surface devices that don’t even meet its own Copilot+ PC memory standard. Now those 32GB recommendations are gone. Microsoft is adjusting to the reality that Windows 11 has become too heavy for the PCs many people actually buy. 8GB should not feel painful for basic browsing, schoolwork, Office, streaming, and productivity, but Windows 11 made it feel that way because the OS is full of WebView2, React Native, background services, widgets, Copilot, and web-wrapper apps pretending to be native. Microsoft’s new plan is finally the right one: reduce Windows 11’s memory footprint for 8GB PCs and above. If Microsoft wants to keep selling 8GB Surface devic

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2 wks

"This is unacceptable, Microsoft." IT admins are furious as Microsoft has just installed "OneDrive Photos" on Windows 11 PCs, and you cannot even use it without a personal Microsoft account. "I’m running an ENTERPRISE version of Windows. I shouldn’t see this BETA app on any machine with this SKU. Also, it is nowhere on the Microsoft roadmap, nor is there a single mention of it in the Message Center," one furious IT admin wrote in a comment. The OneDrive Photos app is being quietly installed on all PCs, including consumer PCs, where the OneDrive sync client is installed. You cannot remove the OneDrive Photos app without deleting OneDrive entirely, and even if you use scripts to remove it, the Photos app comes back again. Some users are also upset that OneDrive Photos is a Microsoft Edge-based app, so you could simply use OneDrive dot com instead. Moreover, OneDrive is already integrated into File Explorer and the Microsoft Photos app. This app was not required. The new OneDr

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2 wks

Microsoft denies adding a new Windows 11 background service to spy on your gaming PC. A viral post claimed that “Windows Health and Optimized Experiences” is a new service quietly running on desktops, sending data to Microsoft every 15 minutes, and doing nothing useful. However, the claim is misleading. The service is not new, and it first showed up in Windows 11 builds in 2025. It has already been documented. Microsoft’s Scott Hanselman has now stepped in to explain what it actually does. According to Microsoft, the service is part of Windows’ diagnostics stack. When Windows detects sluggish behavior, it can capture local performance traces that are only bundled into Feedback Hub if you choose to submit a report. It is not secretly screen recording your PC, and those traces are not silently uploaded every 15 minutes. The funny part is that the account spreading the panic sells paid PC optimization services to gamers 🤷

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3 wks

Sorry, Linux fans, but Linux didn’t just eat 10% of Windows' market share. AI bots are inflating the numbers, and you're reading misleading headlines on the internet. A StatCounter report suggested that Linux's market share is 10% in North America, up from the usual 4-5%. Cloudflare Radar, which also tracks web traffic, points to a 16% Linux share in North America. We have a correlation here, yes, but it's based on a misleading methodology. I verified the numbers and found that Linux's market share was inflated by AI bots. Cloudflare Radar has a feature that lets you view only human traffic (though it can still include false positives), and it shows Linux's market share is still around 4%. Linux is a great operating system, but it's not eating into Windows' market share in double digits. If anything, we're seeing the death of the internet as we know it, as bots continue to make up an increasing share of web traffic. This is worse than the Windows vs. Linux or macOS fan wa

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3 wks

This is the new Print Management app for Windows 11. Yes, Microsoft is now redesigning one of the oldest tools using WinUI. Windows 11 is testing a new Print Management app built as a modern Windows experience instead of the old MMC-style console. Microsoft is going after the deeper legacy parts of Windows 11 that still make the OS feel like five generations of UI stitched together. The new app appears in preview builds as a standalone Windows app, with modern dialogs, updated controls, printer/driver/port management, and the same WinUI 3 direction Microsoft is now using across more of the shell. This follows the modern Run dialog, File Explorer Properties rebuild, upcoming Autoplay refresh, file copy dialog work, and Microsoft’s plan to move more old Windows UI to WinUI 3. Microsoft has stopped building web-based features for Windows 11 and is focusing entirely on the native framework!

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3 wks

I spent 25+ years at Microsoft, and Windows is getting the care it deserves again, writes Microsoft veteran Ewan Dalton. For years, Windows felt like it had become secondary inside Microsoft. The money moved to Microsoft 365, Azure, subscriptions, and then AI. Windows kept getting “sponsored content,” widgets full of ads, missing taskbar features, inconsistent dialogs, and so on. Now the tone is changing, and I'm happy they seem to care about Windows again. The Start menu is being fixed, search is getting calmer, Web junk can be turned off. Widgets are quieter. The taskbar is becoming movable again. File Explorer is getting performance work. Microsoft is backing away from forcing Copilot into Notepad, Snipping Tool, and other inbox apps. This feels like Windows trying to get the “new car smell” back. "In a world where kids might go through all their schooldays and only ever use Chromebooks or iPads, there’s a risk that in another 20 or 30 years, nobody will remember what Wind

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3 wks

Microsoft confirms Windows 11 will run significantly better on 8GB RAM PCs. Instead of adding Copilot and other new AI features to Windows, Microsoft has made it clear that it'll focus only on performance and quality upgrades. For years, Windows 11 has felt heavier than it should, especially on cheaper laptops that still ship with 8GB RAM. Whether you open Teams, Outlook, Widgets, Edge WebView2 apps, or a few browser tabs, suddenly the “modern” Windows 11 experience starts feeling like punishment. Now Microsoft says it is reducing the Windows memory footprint for PCs with 8GB RAM and above. It also says app launches, Start, File Explorer, Search, Snipping Tool, boot, logon, Windows Hello, WinUI 3, Chromium, and WebView2 components are all getting performance and memory work. Windows is so back, and 2026 will be the greatest year for the operating system!

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3 wks