Today at its What’s new for Windows event Microsoft officially revealed Windows 11. We have known for some time that a big update was coming to Windows 10 but only in last few week rumours suggested that it would be Windows 11. Having just watched the event here are my initial thoughts and highlights.
New UI
The biggest visual change is the new start menu. The start menu looks very much like the cancelled Windows 10X start menu with a centred start button. Live tiles are gone and now we have simple icons and recently used files. We have rounded corners everywhere and improved animations with improved dark and light mode. Docking and snapping apps has been improved with snap layouts and snap groups. There is improved multi-monitor support (it remembers how you had it setup) and new Windows Widgets which looks like a re-engineered News and Interest:
Touch support has been improved with better touch targets and gestures and pen input has haptic support.
Under the hood improvements include performance improvements, smaller updates (running in the background), faster start up and lower power consumption.
Android apps on Windows 11
Android apps are also coming to Windows 11 via Amazon app store, so if the app is in the Amazon app store you can run it in Windows 11.
Gaming
For gamers there is auto HDR in games, direct storage support and Xbox cloud gaming built into the Xbox app.
There is a new redesigned Microsoft Store which supports 3rd party commerce engines.
When can we get Windows 11?
Windows 11 will be a free upgrade to Windows 10 and ship on new PCs later this year. The upgrade program will start “holidays” 2021 and continue into next year. Windows Insiders will get their first task of the OS next week.
There are many other changes which I will be delving into over the next few weeks.
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