One of the most commonly used Microsoft programs, Excel is highly useful for data collecting, processing, and analysis. To fully harness Excel’s powers, though, you need to make use of formulas.

Excel formulas allow you to perform calculations, analyze data, and return results quickly and accurately. The usefulness of formulas is even greater once you start dealing with large data sets. With the correct formula, Excel can process vast amounts of information in a matter of seconds.

In this article we’ll look at five useful types of formulas and functions that will get you started performing data analysis in Excel. Along the way, you’ll learn several different ways to enter formulas and functions in Excel.

We’ll demonstrate using Excel for Windows under a Microsoft 365 subscription. If you’re using a different version of Excel, you might not have exactly the same interface and options, but the formulas and functions work the same.

If you have the right kind of M365 subscription, you can have Microsoft’s generative AI assistant, Copilot, create formulas for you. This requires an M365 Personal, Family, or Premium plan for individuals or an M365 business or enterprise plan with a paid Copilot add-on subscription — which means not everybody has access to Copilot in Excel. Even if you do, it’s helpful to know what formulas can do and how to work with them so you can write better prompts for Copilot. We’ll cover using Copilot to create Excel formulas later in this story, but first we’ll give you a solid understanding of how to work with formulas and functions.

In this article:

• What is a formula in Excel?
• What is a function in Excel?
• Basic mathematical formulas and functions
• The IF function
• The SUMIF and COUNTIF functions
• The CONCAT function
• The VLOOKUP function
• Using Copilot to create Excel formulas

What is a formula in Excel?

A formula is an expression that operates on values in a range of cells in Excel. Using formulas, you can perform calculations and data analysis on the contents of the cells. Formulas can be as simple as adding a column of numbers together or as complex as returning the kurtosis of a data set. They can be incredibly useful when you want to turn spreadsheet data into meaningful information for driving business decisions.

What is a function in Excel?

A function is a built-in formula in Excel — basically, a shortcut for performing a calculation or other operation on cell data. There are around 500 Excel functions, and the list continues to grow every year. Fortunately, most of the actions that a typical business user would want to perform can be done with just a handful of functions.

1. Basic mathematical formulas and functions

We’re going to group these formulas together since they are very simple and have similar syntax. All formulas in Excel start with the equal sign (=) and build from there.

Adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing

To add the numbers in two cells together, first click the on the target cell where you want the total to appear. Then type = in the cell to start the formula.

Next, click on the cell that contains the first number you want to add, and its cell reference (such as A2) will appear next to the equal sign in the formula.

Type + next to the first cell reference. Then click the cell that contains the second number you want to add, and its cell reference (such as A3) will appear next to the + sign. The full syntax for the formula to add the values in cells A2 and A3 is:

=A2+A3

Note that in addition to appearing in the target cell, the formula also appears in the formula bar directly above the worksheet. Once you’ve inserted the initial = sign in the target cell, you can type your formula in the formula bar. It’s sometimes easier to see the whole formula and work with it in the formula bar than down in the worksheet page.

If you wanted to add additional numbers to your total, you’d type another + sign, select another cell, and so on. Once your formula is complete, press Enter, and the result appears in the target cell.

Subtraction, multiplication, and division calculations work the same way. You simply change the operator — the symbol that tells Excel what math operation you want to perform — from the + sign to the – sign for subtraction, the * sign for multiplication, or the / sign for division.

Adding numbers with the SUM function

There’s a quicker way to add together a group of numbers. This is where Excel’s built-in SUM function comes in.

First click on the target cell where you want the total to appear. Then type =SUM to start the function.  A list of options will come up. Click the first option, SUM. You’ll now see =SUM( in the target cell.

Just underneath the cell with the SUM function is a tooltip showing the SUM syntax:

=SUM(number 1, [number2],…)

To add individual cells together, select a cell, type a comma, select another cell, and so on. (Alternatively, you can type a cell reference, type a comma, type another cell reference, and so on.)

If you want to add consecutive cells (such as in a row or column), select the first cell, then hold down the Shift key and select the final cell in the group. (Or you can type in the cell references for the first and last cells separated by a colon — for instance, A2:A7 selects A2, A7, and all the cells in between.)

Once all the cells you want to add together are selected, hit Enter.

Now you should see the final result, which is the sum of the numbers you highlighted. If you highlight that target cell again, you’ll see the full formula in the formula bar — in our example, it’s:

=SUM(A2:A7)

One important thing to note for all Excel formulas is that they produce relative values. This simply means that if any of the values in the selected cells changes, then the final number will change to reflect that.

If you want to make it an absolute value, a number that will not change even if the cells that were used to calculate it change, then you need to right-click the cell and select Copy from the pop-up menu. Then right-click the cell again and, under Paste Options, select the Values button (the icon of a clipboard with 123).

Now when you select that cell you’ll just see the plain number, not a formula, in the formula bar.

Tip: Excel provides a SUM shortcut in certain circumstances. If you have a series of numbers in a row or a column, Excel assumes you want to add them together. So if you place your cursor in the cell to the right of a row of numbers and click the AutoSum (Σ) button toward the right end of the Ribbon’s Home tab, Excel automatically selects the numbers in the row, then adds them together when you press Enter. Likewise, if you place your cursor in the cell below a column of numbers, click AutoSum, and hit Enter, Excel totals up the numbers in the column.

Calculating the average with the AVERAGE function

To calculate the average of a group of numbers, repeat the same steps but using the syntax =AVERAGE and highlighting the cells containing the numbers that you want to use in the calculation.

Tip: As with SUM, there’s a shortcut for using the AVERAGE function if you have a series of numbers in a row or a column. Place your cursor in the cell to the right of a row of numbers or in the cell below a column of numbers. Click the tiny down arrow at the right side of the AutoSum button, select Average from the menu that appears, and hit Enter. Excel calculates the average of the values in that row or column.

Find more details, examples, and best practices for these functions at Microsoft’s SUM function and AVERAGE function support pages.

2. The IF function

This function helps you automate the decision-making process by applying if-then logic to your data. Using this function, you can have Excel perform a calculation or display a certain value depending on the outcome of a logical test. For example, you can create a test that checks if the value of a cell is greater than or equal to the value of 18 and enter “Yes” or “No” accordingly.

While we’re learning this function, we’ll cover another way to enter functions in Excel: by using the Formulas tab on the Ribbon. Here you’ll find buttons that provide quick access to functions by category: AutoSum, Financial, Logical, Text, Date & Time, and so on. Being able to browse through functions by category can be helpful if you can’t remember the exact name of a function or aren’t sure how to spell it.

To enter the IF function, select the target cell, and on the Formulas tab, click the Logical button, then select IF from the list of functions that appears.

Alternatively, you can click the Insert Function button all the way to the left of the Formulas tab. An “Insert Function” pane appears, showing a list of commonly used functions.

Select IF from the list and click OK. (If the function you want isn’t in the “Commonly Used” list, select a different category or All to see all available functions.)

The Function Arguments pane appears, and you’ll see =IF() in the target cell.

The IF function syntax is as follows:

=IF(logical_test,”value_if_true”,”value_if_false”)

You’ll notice that the Function Arguments pane for the IF function has fields for Logical_test, Value_if_true, and Value_if_false. In our “greater than or equal to 18” example, the logical test is whether the number in the selected cell is greater than or equal to 18, the value if true is “Yes,” and the value if false is “No.” So we’d enter the following items in the pane’s fields like so:

Logical_test: B2>=18

Value_if_true: “Yes”

Value_if_false: “No”

or just type the full formula into the target cell:

=IF(B2>=18,”Yes”,”No”)

This tells Excel that if the value of cell B2 is greater than or equal to 18, it should enter “Yes” in the target cell. If the value of cell B2 is less than 18, it should enter “No.”

Tip: When using functions like this, rather than entering the function repeatedly for each row, you can simply click and drag the tiny square on the bottom right of the cell that contains the function. Doing so will autofill each of the rows with the formula, and Excel will change your cell references to match. For example, when the formula we used in cell C2 that references cell B2 is autofilled into cell C3, it changes to reference cell B3 automatically.

Find more details at Microsoft’s IF function support page.

3. The SUMIF and COUNTIF functions

SUMIF is a more advanced SUM function that allows you to add up only the values in a range that meet the criteria you specify. To use this function, you must specify the range of cells to apply the criteria to, the criteria for inclusion, and, optionally, the sum range, which is the range of cells to total if that’s different from the initial range. The syntax is as follows:

=SUMIF(range,criteria,[sum_range])

Note that any criteria with text or mathematical or logical symbols must be enclosed in double quotes.

In the sales spreadsheet shown below, for example, suppose you want to total up only the sales that are more than $100. The criteria range is C2 to C9, and the criteria is “greater than 100.” Since you’re adding up the values in that same cell range (C2 to C9), you don’t need to supply a separate sum range. So your formula is:

=SUMIF(C2:C9,”>100″)

What if instead you want to find the total for all sales in the East region only? To do that you’ll have to specify both the criteria range (cells B2 to B9) and the sum range (cells C2 to C9). This is the formula:

=SUMIF(B2:B9,B2,C2:C9)

Note that you don’t have to type out “East” for the criteria. You can simply type B2 or click the cell B2 to have Excel search for the text it contains.

There is a similar function called COUNTIF that lets you create a count of values that meet specified criteria. The syntax is as follows:

=COUNTIF(range,criteria)

So to count the total number of sales in the West region, for instance, you supply the range of cells to apply the criteria to (B2 to B9), followed by the criteria (“West” or cell B3). The formula is:

=COUNTIF(B2:B9,B3)

What if you want to apply multiple criteria to your data, such as calculating total sales for books in the East region, or counting the number of sales over $100 in the West region? Excel can do that too, via functions called SUMIFS and COUNTIFS. These functions use more complex syntax than SUMIF and COUNTIF. For more details, use cases, and best practices for all four of these functions, see Microsoft’s SUMIF, SUMIFS, COUNTIF, and COUNTIFS support pages.

4. The CONCAT function

This function is useful for piecing together text from different cells into one complete string. For instance, maybe you have a worksheet with different columns for people’s first and last names, but you want to put first and last names together. Other common use cases are completing an address, reference number, file path, or URL. The syntax is as follows:

=CONCAT(text1,text2,text3,…)

In this example we will use CONCAT to combine a list of first names and last names into a full name with a space in between. To do so we simply place the cursor in cell C2, type =CON and select CONCAT from the list of options that appears. Next, select the cell that contains the first name (A2) and add a comma, a blank space surrounded by quotation marks, and another comma. Then add the last name by selecting the adjacent cell (B2) and hit Enter. Here’s the full formula:

=CONCAT(A2,” “,B2)

Next, click and drag the bottom right of cell C2 to autofill the formula in all the other rows.

For more details and examples, see Microsoft’s CONCAT function support page.

5. The VLOOKUP function

This is one of the most commonly used functions in Excel and a valuable data analysis tool. VLOOKUP lets you look up a value in a table and return information from other columns related to that value. It’s very useful for combining data from different lists or comparing two lists to find matching items. To use this function, you need to provide three to four pieces of information:

1. The value you want to look for. This is known as the lookup value.
2. The range of cells to look in. This is known as the table array.
3. The column that contains the information you want to return, called the column index number.
4. Optionally, the type of lookup you want to perform: TRUE or FALSE. This is known as the range lookup. FALSE means you want an exact match for the lookup value, while picking TRUE returns the best approximate match. If you don’t specify a range lookup, VLOOKUP defaults to TRUE.

The syntax is as follows:

=VLOOKUP(lookup_value,table_array,column_index_number,[range_lookup])

The lookup value must be in the first column of cells you specify in the table array. The leftmost column in the table array has a column index number of 1, with subsequent columns numbered 2, 3, and so on.

In this example, we’ll look up what region our employees work in. To do so, we first need to specify the value that we are going to search for: the employee name Mike (cell A2). Next, we need to highlight the entire cell range (table array) that we want to look in: cells F2:G8.

Then we specify which column holds the information that we want. Rather than picking the column itself, we count from left to right within the table array. Since the column that contains the region is the second from the left, type in 2.

Lastly, we enter the TRUE (best approximate match) or FALSE (exact match) option. TRUE is typically only used with numbers or when you aren’t sure if the value you want is in the table. Since we know the value we want is in the table, we will pick FALSE. Generally, FALSE is the better option, as it returns more accurate results.

This is the full formula:

=VLOOKUP(A2,F2:G8,2,FALSE)

This is an oversimplified example using a small data set, but when you need to search through a spreadsheet with thousands (or tens of thousands) of cells, VLOOKUP is a huge time-saver and reduces the possibility of errors. For more details and examples, see Microsoft’s VLOOKUP function support page.

Using Copilot to create Excel formulas

Remembering all these different formulas and functions can be difficult, so another good approach for those who have access to Copilot in Excel (see details at the top of this story) is to use the AI tool to dynamically create formulas that meet your needs. Using Copilot, you can describe what you want the formula to do  and have the AI generate the syntax for you. In this section we’ll demonstrate with two sample data sets.

To access Copilot, click the Copilot icon on your ribbon toolbar or at the bottom right of your screen.

The Copilot sidebar opens along the right side of your spreadsheet. Type in a prompt describing the formula you want created — in this example, a simple formula that adds up all the sales values in the data set. Be sure to instruct Copilot where to place the formula:

Create a formula in B7 that sums all of the sales

Click the submit arrow in the chat window, and Copilot will create and insert the formula to give you the result you want.

That was a simple one. Now try a more advanced example working from a more complex data set, as shown in the screenshot below.

Try the following prompt:

Create a formula in G2 that calculates total revenue per unit while accounting for the discount on each purchase. Then fill the formula down for all rows and create a summary table showing total revenue by Region.

Click the submit arrow, and it should create something like this:

(There’s a lot more you can have Copilot can do in Excel besides creating formulas. See our story “11 cool things Copilot can do in Excel.”)

Tip: It’s not required, but it can be helpful to format your spreadsheet as a table when working with Copilot. This helps define more clearly the exact cells for Copilot to use when it creates formulas or takes other actions on your data.

You’re just getting started

In this story you’ve seen how powerful formulas and functions can be in Excel — and we’ve only the scratched the surface of what they can do. Once you get comfortable using them, you can explore some of the myriad prebuilt functions Excel offers and learn how to build more complex formulas (including nesting functions). That’s all beyond the scope of this article, but a great place to start is Microsoft’s “Overview of formulas in Excel” support page, which includes links to several helpful tutorials.

For those who have access to it in Excel, experimenting with Copilot is another great way to learn. You can review the steps it took and the formulas it created to get a better understanding of how formulas work and what they’re capable of.

This story was originally published in May 2023 and updated in June 2026.

More Excel tips and how-tos:

• Excel basics: Get started with tables
• Excel for Microsoft 365 cheat sheet
• 11 cool things Copilot can do in Excel
• How to use PivotTables and PivotCharts in Excel
• Excel basics: Get started with charts and sparklines
• How (and why) to use conditional formatting in Excel
• More Microsoft tips and tutorials

Microsoft has introduced usage-based billing for Copilot Cowork, which is now generally available. 

Microsoft unveiled Copilot Cowork in March, pitching it as an AI agent that’s capable of independently performing long-running, multi-step tasks — even when a user’s computer is off. 

It’s built on the same technology that underpins Anthropic’s Claude Cowork. Unlike Claude Cowork, which can interact directly with files and applications on a user’s computer, Copilot Cowork runs in Microsoft’s cloud environment and acts on documents held in a customer’s Microsoft 365 tenant.

On Tuesday, Microsoft unveiled pricing details for Copilot Cowork, which involves usage-based billing in addition to a Microsoft 365 Copilot license ($30 per user each month for large enterprises before discounts, and $20 for Microsoft 365 Copilot for Business). 

The usage-based pricing is calculated from four components, according to Microsoft: “model use, context retrieval, tool calls, and runtime.” 

In practice, this means more intensive tasks that draw on multiple sources, use “deep reasoning” and generate two or more outputs will lead to higher costs — denoted in Copilot Credits. 

There are two payment options: pay as you go — priced at 1 cent per credit — and P3, where customers commit to usage volume in advance and receive a discount.

Cowork is turned off by default; IT admins can decide when to make it available and which employees get access. Admins can also impose spending limits at the tenant, group, and user level, and receive notifications when spending reaches a certain level.

Users will also be able to see how much each tasks costs in credits (available “soon after” the general availability launch, Microsoft said). 

Copilot Cowork customers can select from multiple AI models, including Anthropic’s Opus 4.8 and Sonnet 4.6, while those enrolled on the Frontier program can access OpenAI’s GPT 5.5 and Microsoft’s own Cowork 1 model.

Microsoft is considering hosting a version of DeepSeek’s open source models. “We are actively exploring a range of options that meet those requirements, and DeepSeek is one of several models under consideration. We’ll share more specifics on the underlying model closer to release,” said a Microsoft spokesperson.

Microsoft also announced new integrations with third-party apps such as Miro and Monday.com, with more — such as Adobe, Box, and Canva — coming soon.

This article was updated on June 19 to add Microsoft’s comment on DeepSeek.

Despite best efforts by defenders, malicious emails continue to slip through the cybersecurity cracks, leading some enterprises to implement a layered “defense in depth” strategy that incorporates multiple tools.

Microsoft seems to be challenging this idea, revealing that there are only nominal returns from adding integrated pre- and post-send partners to Defender for Office 365’s protections.

According to its new quarterly benchmarking data, the tech giant catches the vast majority of malicious and spam emails before delivery, misses the fewest compared to competitors by a wide margin, and removes nearly 100% of dangerous emails that do reach the inbox. Collectively, its integrated partners improve that catch rate by less than .05%.

While these numbers seem to tip the scales towards a one-vendor email security stack, experts urge enterprises to be skeptical and cautious of such vendor claims.

Seva Ioussoufovitch, senior research analyst at Info-Tech Research Group, pointed out, “percentages obscure the true quantity and severity of what’s getting through, and, considering it only takes one message to result in an incident, it’s simple enough to argue that there is real value in the defense in depth that having multiple tools provides.”

Malicious and spam email catch by the numbers

Microsoft introduced its quarterly benchmarking report in July 2025 alongside a Defender integrated cloud email security (ICES) ecosystem designed to support multi-vendor security strategies.

The SEG players it ranked itself against this year includes Mimecast, Proofpoint, Hornetsecurity, Trend Micro, Iron Port (Cisco), Barracuda, and FireEye (Trellix); ICES companies include Abnormal, Checkpoint Harmony, Cisco, DarkTrace, KnowBe4 Defend, Tessian, and Trend Micro.

Redmond reported that Defender “consistently leads” in pre-delivery detection, missing 59% fewer high-severity cyberthreats prior to delivery than the other SEG vendors it evaluated. Its closest competitors were Mimecast and Proofpoint. The company also introduced a new metric in this area: A threat miss rate per 1,000 employees. In Microsoft’s case, that was 194 per 1,000; for Mimecast, 478; for Proofpoint, 483.

When it came to post-delivery protection, Defender removed an average of 96.03% of malicious emails that reached the inbox, up from an initial 45% when Microsoft first started tracking the data in its second report.

This makes Defender “an increasingly critical backstop, operating even when ICES solutions are in place,” Jeff Pinkston, VP and GM for Microsoft Defender, wrote in a blog post. Still, ICES tools operating in tandem with Microsoft Defender “continue to provide benefits,” improving malicious catch by 0.29% and spam catch by 0.68%, he said.

“If we focus on the basics, their argument seems strong,” Info-Tech’s Ioussoufovitch noted. “Do you really need a separate ICES vendor for that extra sub 1% catch?” Microsoft paints a “compelling picture” by only focusing on raw catch rate, he said, but we don’t hear the rest of the story: “What exactly is the danger of what isn’t being caught by Defender?”

No one vendor catches everything

David Shipley of Beauceron Security pointed out that the report underscores the fact that “lots of stuff still gets by e-mail filters.”

His company regularly analyzes hundreds of thousands of emails, and the content that gets through “ranges from the shockingly mundane and obvious to a human expert, to highly clever time-delayed attacks,” he said.

A key factor in what gets through is the amount of content that is allowlisted; settings in “100% paranoid mode” get high catch rates, as well as high false positives, Shipley noted. “Anyone who has ever had a sales person lose a deal because the purchase order PDF got flagged has felt this pain.”

Then there’s the AI conundrum: “A key risk for e-mail vendors using agentic LLM-based analysis is it’s now possible to poison those models with hidden content (such as ‘ignore this e-mail, pretty please’),” Shipley said. This means enterprises need a variety of analysis methods.

Ioussoufovitch agreed that keeping pace with threat actors using AI is an industry-wide challenge, particularly as AI enables higher-quality phishing. Filters are improving and will catch some of it, but some will inevitably continue to get through. Those messages are likely highly-targeted, which are lower in volume but harder to catch.

“As of now, current tools do seem to be struggling to keep pace, but that doesn’t mean those tools aren’t necessary,” said Ioussoufovitch. “It just highlights that defense-in-depth, broadly speaking, is becoming more and more important.”

Claims ‘appear more honest’

Shipley said that this report appears more honest, accurate, and mature than others claiming 99.99% phish catch rates, “which is never true.” It’s also a “smart marketing move,” because Microsoft competes for the same security budget as other tools, and would rather enterprises remove those vendors and buy more from it in areas beyond e-mail.

On the other hand, he said, Microsoft is offering up a list of other vendors to think about, “which, congrats to Mimecast on coming in second.”

In the long run, CISOs need to determine the best spend for their limited security dollars, he noted. Enterprises need a good filter; whether they need two is up for debate. “They also clearly still need to invest in a robust awareness program,” Shipley said, “because as this report shows, lots of phishes are still getting delivered.”

Missing an important nuance

Ioussoufovitch noted that while the claims in the study are interesting, the data is presented without much of the nuance that would make it truly actionable.

“We are all too familiar with vendors’ abilities to massage data to tell the story they want, so I would advise leaders not to extrapolate the data beyond what it actually says,” he said.

Instead of the takeaway being “get rid of our current vendors,” this post highlights that Defender provides “considerable value,” he noted. Whether adding or subtracting additional vendors is worth the money should be a case-by-case conversation that considers an organization’s risk appetite, and overall security budget and environment.

“I’d treat these claims more as a reminder to assess your own environment and compare detections,” he said. “Come to conclusions based on the data you have, not what a vendor is presenting.”

This article originally appeared on CSOonline.

Windows 11 25H2 has been publicly released, but behind the scenes, Microsoft is constantly working to improve the newest version of Windows. The company frequently rolls out preview builds to members of its Windows Insider Program, allowing them to test out — and help shape — upcoming features.

Skip to the latest builds

Our story “How to preview and deploy Windows 10 and 11 updates” details how the Insider program has worked until now. However, Microsoft recently announced sweeping changes to the program that will include the ability to select which new features to test. As the first step, the company is introducing a new channel system and transitioning Insiders like so:

• Beta Channel > Beta
• Beta Channel (for devices on Windows 11 version 26H1) > Beta (26H1)
• Dev Channel > Experimental
• Canary Channel (28000 series) > Experimental (26H1)
• Canary Channel (29500 series) > Experimental (Future Platforms)
• Release Preview Channel > Release Preview 24H2/25H2
• Release Preview Channel (for devices on Windows 11 version 26H1) > Release Preview (26H1)

This transition is happening over time, starting with the Dev Channel. See Microsoft’s blog post for more information about the transition.

Below you’ll find information about the Windows 11 preview builds that have been announced by Microsoft in the past six months. For each build, we’ve included the date of its release, which Insider channel it was released to, a summary of what’s in the build, and a link to Microsoft’s announcement about it.

Note: If you’re looking for information about updates being rolled out to all Windows 11 users, not preview builds for Windows Insiders, see “Windows 11: A guide to the updates.”

The latest Windows 11 Insider preview builds

Windows 11 Insider Release Preview Builds 26100.8728 and 26200.8728

Release date: June 12, 2026

Released to: Release Preview 24H2/25H2 Channel

A wide variety of features and enhancements are being gradually rolled out in this build, including increased reliability of the Windows networking stack. It reduces bug checks (blue screen errors) related to Wi-Fi power and improves cellular (WWAN) connectivity, including support for IPv6 VPNs. Compatibility with third-party VPN software and SR-IOV configurations on server hardware is also improved. Network adapter settings and bindings are now preserved across OS upgrades.

Immediately rolling out are several quality improvements, including additional high-confidence device targeting data, increasing coverage of devices eligible to automatically receive new Secure Boot certificates. Devices receive the new certificates only after demonstrating sufficient successful update signals, maintaining a controlled and phased rollout.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Builds 26100.8728 and 26200.8728.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28000.2333

Released to: Release Preview 26H1 Channel

Release date: June 12, 2026

This build, for Insiders using Windows 11 26H1, gradually rolls out a wide variety of new features, including improved visibility into NPU usage in Task Manager. New optional NPU and NPU Engine columns are available on the Processes, Users, and Details pages, along with NPU Dedicated Memory and NPU Shared Memory optional columns on the Details page. Neural engines that are part of a GPU now appear on the Performance page, providing a more complete view of AI-related activity. A new optional Isolation column on the Processes and Details pages shows which apps are running in an AppContainer. You can add any of the new columns by right-clicking a column header in Task Manager and selecting them from the menu.

Being rolled out immediately is improved Netlogon secure channel connections between domain controllers, enabling successful connections from member servers to domain controllers set up before 2025.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28000.2333.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8680

Release date: June 12, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

This update offers a wide variety of changes and improvements, including a new set of default Widget settings designed to reduce unexpected alerts and visual interruptions. They include:

• Disabling Open on hover by default
• Turning off Taskbar badging by default
• Opening to widgets experience on first launch
• Placing Weather as the only default widget on the lockscreen
• Restricting the number of Taskbar alerts that can be sent daily
• Limiting Taskbar alerts until you choose to open and engage with the Widgets experience

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8680.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.2298

Release date: June 12, 2026

Released to: Beta 26H1 Channel

This update, in the words of Microsoft, “includes a small set of general improvements and fixes that improve the overall experience” of running Windows 11 26H1. It also introduces the new screen tint accessibility setting. In addition, Task Scheduler will now persist column width adjustments in task list view across sessions.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.2298.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8687

Release date: June 12, 2026

Released to: Experimental Channel (formerly Dev)

Several minor new features and enhancements are being rolled out gradually in this build, including improved reliability of loading the system tray area of the taskbar and a new recovery remote management plug-in for extending WinRE management capabilities for MDM providers.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8687.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28120.2302

Release date: June 12, 2026

Released to: Experimental 26H1 Channel (formerly Canary)

This update, in the words of Microsoft, “includes a small set of general improvements and fixes that improve the overall experience” of running Windows 11 26H1. It also accelerates app launch and core shell experiences such as Start menu, Search, and Action Center.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28120.2302.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29599.1000

Release date: June 12, 2026

Released to: Experimental Future Platforms Channel (formerly Canary optional 29500)

This build gradually rolls out several minor changes and improvements, including improved performance when navigating to see storage on large volumes via Settings > System > Storage > Advanced Storage Settings > Disks & Volumes.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29610.1000.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8575

Release date: June 8, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

This update adds the ability to extend Windows Update as many times as you need. It also fixes three bugs: one that caused audio not to work, another that impacted the reliability of Settings > Apps > Installed Apps, and a third that caused freezes with search, Notepad, and other parts of Windows.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8575.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.2236

Release date: June 8, 2026

Released to: Beta 26H1 Channel

This update, in the words of Microsoft, “includes a small set of general improvements and fixes that improve the overall experience” of running Windows 11 version 26H1.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.2236.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28120.2242

Release date: June 8, 2026

Released to: Experimental 26H1 Channel (formerly Canary)

This update, in the words of Microsoft, “includes a small set of general improvements and fixes that improve the overall experience” of running Windows 11 version 26H1.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28120.2242.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8544

Release date: May 29, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

Several minor new improvements and fixes are being rolled out in this build, including consistent solid (donut) spinners across key Windows scenarios including Boot, Logon, Restart, Shutdown, and Update. This update replaces legacy spinner visuals to deliver a more cohesive experience aligned with Windows design standards. Users will now see a unified spinner behavior with corresponding status text (e.g., “Restarting”, “Working on updates”, “Welcome”).

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8544.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8553

Release date: May 29, 2026

Released to: Experimental Channel (formerly Dev)

Several minor new features are being rolled out gradually in this build, including a number of changes to the Start menu. These were first outlined in the May 15 Insider blog post Making Taskbar and Start more personal. They include:

• “Recommended” section renamed to “Recent” in Start and Settings page
• Section-level toggles to independently show or hide Pinned, Recommended, and All
• Choose between a small and large Start menu, in addition to already available “Automatic (default)” setting
• Option to hide your name and profile picture in Start
• Redesigned Start menu settings page

One known issue, in which resetting your PC may have gotten stuck when using “Reset this PC,” has been fixed.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8553.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.2207

Release date: May 29, 2026

Released to: Experimental 26H1 Channel (formerly Canary)

This update, in Microsoft’s words, “includes a small number of minor bug fixes and improvements.”

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.2207.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29599.1000

Release date: May 29, 2026

Released to: Experimental Future Platforms Channel (formerly Canary optional 29500)

This build gradually rolls out several minor changes and improvements that, in the words of Microsoft, include “platform changes in moving to a new active development build.” The update also gradually rolls out a fix for a bug in which some Insiders unexpectedly saw an erroneous message saying they weren’t connected to internet (when they actually were) when signing into their Microsoft account in certain apps. It also improves CPU speed display on the Performance page of Task Manager for VMs, so it doesn’t show higher than unexpected numbers after resuming from hibernate.

There is one known issue that causes crashes with AMD machines supporting System Guard, so these devices in Windows Information Protection will not be offered the build.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29599.1000.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8491

Release date: May 22, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

This update, in Microsoft’s words, “includes a small number of minor bug fixes and improvements.” It introduces Voice Isolation, a new option in Voice Access that helps the tool focus on your voice, even when others are speaking nearby, by filtering out other voices and background noise.

Microsoft says the single known issue with this release, in which your PC could have gotten stuck when using “Reset this PC,” has been fixed.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8491.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8497

Release date: May 22, 2026

Released to: Experimental Channel (formerly Dev)

A variety of new features are being rolled out gradually in this build, including several to improve accessibility. Among them are making it easier to connect the Braille display to Narrator by using the HID open industry standard for Braille displays. If your display supports HID, connect it via USB, with no additional setup required. For Bluetooth, pair your HID Braille display in Settings > Bluetooth & devices just like any other accessory. Another new feature is Voice Isolation in Voice Access, as detailed for Beta Channel Build 26220.8491 above.

The build has one known issue, in which your PC may get stuck when using “Reset this PC.” To complete the reset successfully, choose the cloud download option (Cloud PBR) instead of local.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8497.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.2149

Released to: Experimental 26H1 Channel (formerly Canary)

Release date: May 22, 2026

This build, for Insiders using Windows 11 26H1, gradually rolls out a wide variety of new features, including one that improves the reliability of explorer.exe when closing the input switcher, and when switching between multiple desktops.

Microsoft says the single known issue with this release, in which your PC could have gotten stuck when using “Reset this PC,” has been fixed.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.2149.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29595.1000

Release date: May 22, 2026

Released to: Experimental Future Platforms Channel (formerly Canary optional 29500)

This build, in the words of Microsoft, “includes platform changes in moving to a new active development build.”

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29595.1000.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8474

Release date: May 15, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

Several minor new improvements are being rolled out in this build, including one that improves the reliability of Simple Service Discovery Protocol (SSDP) notifications to help prevent the service from becoming unresponsive.

It has one known issue in which your PC may get stuck when using “Reset this PC.” To complete the reset successfully, choose the cloud download option (Cloud PBR) instead of local.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8474.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8493

Release date: May 15, 2026

Released to: Experimental Channel (formerly Dev)

A variety of new features are being rolled out gradually in this build, including the ability to change the position of taskbar on your screen. In Settings > Personalization > Taskbar > Taskbar Behaviors, you can select the side of the screen you want your taskbar on: bottom, top, left, or right. In these other positions, tooltips, flyouts, and animations will still come from the taskbar, and most customization settings like “small taskbar” and “never combine taskbar icons” will work with all locations.

It has one known issue in which your PC may get stuck when using “Reset this PC.” To complete the reset successfully, choose the cloud download option (Cloud PBR) instead of local.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8493.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.2134

Release date: May 15, 2026

Released to: Experimental 26H1 Channel (formerly Canary)

This build gradually rolls out an improvement in the reliability of Simple Service Discovery Protocol (SSDP) notifications to help prevent the service from becoming unresponsive. It also rolls out gradual changes to updating Windows, including the ability to skip updates immediately during the out of box experience (OOBE) and to extend update pauses as many times as you need.

It has one known issue in which your PC may get stuck when using “Reset this PC.” To complete the reset successfully, choose the cloud download option (Cloud PBR) instead of local.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.2134.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29591.1000

Release date: May 15, 2026

Released to: Experimental Future Platforms Channel (formerly Canary optional 29500)

This build introduces new features for Windows Update, including the ability to skip updates immediately during the out of box experience (OOBE) and to extend update pauses as many times as you need. New Windows update features also include having always available options to shut down and restart with updating, and additional insight about available updates to make more informed installation decisions.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29591.1000.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Builds 26200.8514/26200.8514

Release date: May 14, 2026

Released to: Release Preview 24H2/25H2 Channel

A wide variety of features and enhancements are being gradually rolled out in this build, including a new shared audio feature that allows two people to listen to the same audio from a single Windows 11 PC at the same time. In addition, Task Manager now offers improved visibility into NPU usage on PCs with an NPU. New optional NPU and NPU Engine columns are available on the Processes, Users, and Details pages, along with NPU Dedicated Memory and NPU Shared Memory optional columns on the Details page. 

One new feature is being rolled out immediately, in which Windows quality updates now include additional high-confidence device targeting data, increasing coverage of devices eligible to automatically receive new Secure Boot certificates. Devices receive the new certificates only after demonstrating sufficient successful update signals, maintaining a controlled and phased rollout.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Builds 26200.8514/26220.8514.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28000.2173

Released to: Release Preview 26H1 Channel

Release date: May 14, 2026

This build, for Insiders using Windows 11 26H1, gradually rolls out a wide variety of new features, including one that expands the list of archive formats that can be used in File Explorer to include uu, cpio, xar, and NuGet Packages (nupkg). Also being gradually rolled out is a new way to monitor your agents from the taskbar. It supports agents across first- and third-party apps, with Researcher in the Microsoft 365 Copilot app as the first adopter.

One new feature is being rolled out immediately, in which Windows quality updates now include additional high-confidence device targeting data, increasing coverage of devices eligible to automatically receive new Secure Boot certificates. Devices receive the new certificates only after demonstrating sufficient successful update signals, maintaining a controlled and phased rollout.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28000.2173.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8370

Release date: May 8, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

Several minor new improvements are being gradually rolled out in this build, including improved reliability of Japanese IME usage when Administrator Protection is enabled. In addition, the build fixes a single bug, in which there were notification issues and certain apps hung on launch.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8370.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8376

Release date: May 8, 2026

Released to: Experimental Channel (formerly Dev)

A variety of new features are being rolled out gradually in this build, including new File Explorer address bar support for paths containing double backslashes and quotation marks (for example, C:\Users\user or “C:\Users\user”), improving compatibility with a wider range of inputs.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8376.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.2075

Release date: May 8, 2026

Released to: Experimental 26H1 Channel (formerly Canary)

This build gradually rolls out, in Microsoft’s words, “a small set of general improvements and fixes that improve the overall experience” of running Windows 26H1. It also improves performance when opening clipboard history.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.2075.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29585.1000

Release date: May 6, 2026

Released to: Experimental Future Platforms Channel (formerly Canary optional 29500)

This build gradually rolls out, in Microsoft’s words, “platform changes in moving to a new active development build.”

It also updates the experience when you use voice typing with the touch keyboard. To reduce distractions, the new design removes the previous full‑screen overlay and instead shows voice typing animations directly on the dictation key.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29585.1000.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8340

Release date: May 1, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

Several minor new improvements are being gradually rolled out in this build, including making Windows ShareSheet more intelligent for Azure Active Directory (AAD) users, with a simple setting to turn promotional app recommendations on or off. Previously, that capability was only available to Windows users with Managed Service Accounts (MSA).

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8340.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8346

Release date: May 1, 2026

Released to: Experimental Channel (formerly Dev)

A variety of new features are being rolled out gradually in this build, including making Windows ShareSheet more intelligent for Azure Active Directory (AAD) users, with a simple setting to turn promotional app recommendations on or off. Previously, that capability was only available to Windows users with Managed Service Accounts (MSA). Another change “quiets” the default behavior for Widgets, with the goal of making them feel less distracting and overwhelming.

There are several known issues in this build, including one in which Insiders who use Feature flags to enable the new WIP experience may see the feature state incorrectly marked as current; however, changing state and applying changes will work as expected.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8346.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1921

Release date: May 1, 2026

Released to: Experimental 26H1 Channel (formerly Canary)

This build gradually rolls out several improvements to Task Manager, including one that provides better insight into NPU usage for PCs that include an NPU. Optional NPU and NPU Engine columns are now available on the Processes, Users, and Details pages, with optional NPU Dedicated Memory and NPU Shared Memory columns on the Details page to give you deeper visibility into how workloads are using NPU resources. Additionally, if there are neural engines that are part of a GPU, they will now appear on the Performance page, providing a more complete view of AI‑related system activity.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1921.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29580.1000

Release date: May 1, 2026

Released to: Experimental Future Platforms Channel (formerly Canary optional 29500)

This build gradually rolls out, in Microsoft’s words, “a small set of general improvements and fixes that improve the overall experience for Insiders running this build on their PCs.”

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29580.1000.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8283

Release date: April 24, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

Several minor new improvements and fixes are being gradually rolled out in this build, including improved detection of clicks at the leftmost edge of the taskbar to invoke the Start menu when the taskbar icons are left-aligned.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8283.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8289

Release date: April 24, 2026

Released to: Experimental Channel (formerly Dev)

In a phased rollout, Insiders in the Dev Channel are being moved to the new Experimental channel. Insiders who do not see the new experience on their device can enable it under Settings > Windows Update > Windows Insider Program > Feature flags.

Several minor new features are also being rolled out gradually in this build, including improved detection of clicks at the leftmost edge of the taskbar to invoke the Start menu when the taskbar icons are left-aligned.

There is one known issue in this build: Insiders who use Feature flags to enable the new Insider experience may see the feature state incorrectly marked as current; however, changing the state and applying changes should work as expected.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8289.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28200.1873

Release date: April 24, 2026

Released to: Experimental 26H1 Channel (formerly Canary)

This build is gradually rolling out a variety of small improvements, including an updated voice typing experience for the touch keyboard. To reduce distractions, the new design shows voice typing animations directly on the dictation key rather than on a full-screen overlay.

It also fixes a bug in which Settings > Network & Internet > Data Usage showed large, unrealistic values.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28200.1873.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29576.1000

Release date: April 24, 2026

Released to: Experimental Future Platforms Channel (formerly Canary optional 29500)

This build is gradually rolling out a variety of changes, including Point-in-time restore for Windows, which can quickly roll your device back to a previous state, potentially helping minimize downtime and simplify troubleshooting when disruptions strike. 

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29576.1000.)

Windows 11 Builds 26100.8313 and 26200.8313 (KB5083631) 

Release date: April 17, 2026

Released to: Release Preview Channel

This build introduces a wide variety of new features rolled out gradually, including a new way to monitor your agents from the taskbar. It supports agents across first- and third-party apps, with Researcher in the Microsoft 365 Copilot app as the first adopter. When Researcher works on a report, Windows shows progress on the taskbar so you can check updates at a glance.

For IT administrators, the update gradually rolls out support for a dynamic app removal list to the “Remove Default Microsoft Store packages” policy for Windows Enterprise and Education. It also removes default trust for cross‑signed third-party drivers, while drivers from the Windows Hardware Compatibility Program (WHCP) and an allow list of trusted legacy drivers remain allowed. Enterprise State Roaming can now be managed through Windows Backup for Organizations policies.

The update also immediately introduces two minor improvements for everyone. Windows quality updates now include additional high-confidence device targeting data, which increases coverage of devices eligible to automatically receive new Secure Boot certificates. In Windows Security, the name of the affected application is now included in event logging related to CVE‑2024‑30098. This change makes it easier to identify applications that rely on smart card certificates and may need updates following recent security changes.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Builds 26100.8313 and 26200.8313.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8271

Release date: April 17, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

Several minor new features were made available in this build for those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, including improved reliability and performance of Windows Hello fingerprint after your PC wakes from sleep.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8271.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8276

Release date: April 17, 2026

Released to: Dev Channel

In this build, several minor new features are being gradually rolled for those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, including improved reliability and performance of Windows Hello fingerprint after your PC wakes from sleep.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8276.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1863

Release date: April 17, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build fixes a bug that prevented some apps from signing in due to a false report of no internet connectivity. The fix is rolling out gradually.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1863.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29570.1000

Release date: April 17, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel (29500 build series)

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates in the Canary Channel on the optional 29500 build series, this build has a variety of minor changes rolling out gradually, including more widget options and support for lock screen widget personalization, a new setting in Settings > Bluetooth & Devices > Touchpad that lets you can choose how large the right-click zone is, and support for a dynamic app removal list to the “Remove Default Microsoft Store packages” policy for Windows Enterprise and Education.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29570.1000.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8165

Release date: April 10, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build gradually rolls out several minor features, including one in which the size limit for formatting FAT32 volumes via the command line has increased from 32GB to 2TB, and another in which the Windows Security app gets new badges and text that reflect your device’s Secure Boot state and certificate status.

It also gradually rolls out a fix for a bug that caused Settings > Network & Internet > Data Usage to show large, unrealistic values.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8165.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8170

Release date: April 10, 2026

Released to: Dev Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build gradually rolls out several minor features, including one in which the size limit for formatting FAT32 volumes via the command line has increased from 32GB to 2TB, and another in which the Windows Security app gets new badges and text that reflect your device’s Secure Boot state and certificate status.

It also gradually rolls out a fix for a bug that caused Settings > Network & Internet > Data Usage to show large, unrealistic values.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8170.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1812

Release date: April 10, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build gradually rolls out general improvements and fixes, including a new setting that lets users choose the size of their touchpad’s right-click zone, as well as new badges and text in the Windows Security app that reflect your device’s Secure Boot state and certificate status.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1812.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29565.1000

Release date: April 10, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel (29500 build series)

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates in the Canary Channel on the optional 29500 build series, this build includes “platform changes in moving to a new active development build,” as well as new badges and text in the Windows Security app that reflect your device’s Secure Boot state and certificate status

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29565.1000.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8148

Release date: April 3, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build gradually rolls out several minor features, including a new icon in print settings to indicate when a printer supports Windows Protected Print Mode.

Several bugs are also being fixed, including one in which some apps weren’t able to sign in, citing an internal connection issue when internet was actually connected.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8148.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8155

Release date: April 3, 2026

Released to: Dev Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build gradually rolls out several minor features, including one in which users will be able to feel haptic feedback effects on compatible input devices while performing certain actions, such as aligning objects in PowerPoint, window snapping, resizing, or hovering over the Close button. These haptic effects can be configured in Settings under Bluetooth & devices > Mouse > Haptic signals.

Several bugs have also been fixed, including one in which some apps weren’t able to sign in, citing an internal connection issue when internet was actually connected.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8155.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1803

Release date: April 3, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates in the Canary Channel, this build includes a small set of general improvements and fixes, including improved reliability for configuring the fluid dictation option in voice typing settings.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1803.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29560.1000

Release date: April 3, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel (29500 build series)

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates in the Canary Channel on the optional 29500 build series, this build “includes platform changes in moving to a new active development build,” in the words of Microsoft. Several bugs have also been fixed, including one in which attached USB devices weren’t working for some Insiders.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29560.1000.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8138

Release date: March 30, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build gradually rolls out several new features, including one in which you can enable Administrator Protection in Settings under Privacy & security > Windows Security > Account protection and switching the toggle to on. A restart will be required. 

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8138.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8142

Release date: March 30, 2026

Released to: Dev Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build gradually rolls out several new features, including one in which you can enable Administrator Protection in Settings under Privacy & security > Windows Security > Account protection and switching the toggle to on. A restart will be required. 

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8142.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1797

Release date: March 30, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel

This update, in the words of Microsoft, “includes a small set of general improvements and fixes that improve the overall experience” of running Windows 11.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1797.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29558.1000

Release date: March 30, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel (29500 build series)

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates in the Windows 11 Insider Canary Channel on the optional 29500 build series, this build introduces several new features, including a variety of improvements to the Windows Console, many of which were created by open-source contributors. Several bugs have also been fixed, including an authentication error people received when trying to connect to Azure Virtual Desktop.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29558.1000.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8079

Release date: March 20, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build gradually rolls out several bug fixes, including for one in which the Network and Sharing Center incorrectly displayed two active Wi-Fi connections after switching from one Wi-Fi network to another. The Network and Sharing Center now correctly shows a single active Wi-Fi connection when you connect to a new network. 

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8079.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8085

Release date: March 20, 2026

Released to: Dev Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build resumes rollout of the Point Indicator Accessibility setting, which enables low-vision users to easily locate and use their cursor. The build also introduces the new Feedback Hub, which offers Insiders simpler navigation and feedback submission flows.

In addition, several bugs were fixed, including one in which the Network and Sharing Center incorrectly displayed two active Wi-Fi connections after switching from one Wi-Fi network to another. The Network and Sharing Center now correctly shows a single active Wi-Fi connection when you connect to a new network.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8085.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1743

Release date: March 20, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build includes several new features being rolled out gradually, including one in which shared audio now provides individual sliders for each listener which adjusts their volume without affecting the other. You can continue to adjust volume for both listeners at the same time through the main volume controls available through Quick Settings or on-device and keyboard controls.

The build also introduces the new Feedback Hub, which offers Insiders simpler navigation and feedback submission flows.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1743.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29553.1000

Release date: March 20, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel (29500 build series)

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates in the Canary Channel’s optional 29500 build series, this build introduces the new Feedback Hub, which offers Insiders simpler navigation and feedback submission flows.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29553.1000.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8062

Release date: March 13, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build includes numerous changes and refinements, including an update to the “Remove Default Microsoft Store packages” policy for Windows Enterprise and Education SKUs that allows IT administrators to remove MSIX/APPX apps by adding their app package family name (PFNs) to a dynamic list.

Starting with this update, the Windows kernel will enforce a new policy removing default trust for cross-signed drivers. The policy allows third-party drivers from the WHCP program by default, with an allow list of trustworthy publishers and drivers from the cross-signing program.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.8062.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8068

Release date: March 13, 2026

Released to: Dev Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build includes numerous changes and refinements, including an update to the “Remove Default Microsoft Store packages” policy for Windows Enterprise and Education SKUs that allows IT administrators to remove MSIX/APPX apps by adding their app package family name (PFNs) to a dynamic list.

Starting with this update, the Windows kernel will enforce a new policy removing default trust for cross-signed drivers. The policy allows third-party drivers from the WHCP program by default, with an allow list of trustworthy publishers and drivers from the cross-signing program.

(Get more info about  Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8068.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1737

Release date: March 13, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build makes refinements to the Pen settings page, including small changes to the options for the pen tail button. A new option, “Same as Copilot key,” enables the pen tail button to launch the same app as the Copilot key.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1737.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29550.1000

Release date: March 13, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel (29500 build series)

For those  who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates in the Canary Channel’s optional 29500 build series, this build has a variety of minor changes, including one in which changes to global power settings (for example, Display, Sleep, Hibernate timeouts, Power/Sleep button, and lid close actions) from Settings are now applied to all power plans. This should help improve persistence of chosen settings.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29550.1000.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Builds 26100.8106 and 26200.8106

Release date: March 12, 2026

Released to: Release Preview Channel

This build introduces a wide range of minor features being rolled out gradually, including the ability to turn Smart App Control (SAC) on or off without needing a clean install. To make changes, go to Settings > Windows Security > App & Browser Control > Smart App Control settings. When turned on, SAC helps block untrusted or potentially harmful apps.

The update also improves stability in Windows Recovery Environment (Windows RE) when you run x64 apps on ARM64 devices. These apps run more smoothly and respond as expected.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Builds 26100.8106 and 26200.8106.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7961

Release date: March 6, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build re-enables Administrator protection, which aims to protect free-floating admin rights for administrator users, allowing them to still perform all admin functions with just-in-time admin privileges. This feature is off by default and can be enabled via OMA-URI in Intune or via group policy.

Other changes and improvements being gradually rolled out to the same group include the ability to use voice typing (Windows key + H) when renaming files in File Explorer, as well as a smaller peek view in the drag tray.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Build 26220.7961.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.7965

Release date: March 6, 2026

Released to: Dev Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build re-enables Administrator protection, which aims to protect free-floating admin rights for administrator users, allowing them to still perform all admin functions with just-in-time admin privileges. This feature is off by default and can be enabled via OMA-URI in Intune or via group policy.

Other changes and improvements being gradually rolled out to the same group include the ability to use voice typing when renaming files in File Explorer, as well as a smaller peek view in the drag tray.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.7965.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1685

Release date: March 6, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build lets you use voice typing (Windows key + H) when renaming files in File Explorer. The build also improves the reliability of removing Windows Update files and windows.old files via Settings > System > Storage.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1685.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7934

Release date: Feb. 27, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build gives administrators and Application Control for Business policy authors additional controls over the processing of batch files and CMD scripts. Starting with this release, admins can enable a more secure mode for processing batch files that ensures they do not change during execution by adding a value to the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Command Processor named LockBatchFilesWhenInUse (DWORD, value 0 or 1). Policy authors can also use the LockBatchFilesWhenInUse application manifest control documented here to enable this mode.

There are a variety of other improvements being rolled out gradually, including one in which a new taskbar indicator displays while you’re sharing, giving a quick reminder that audio is still being shared. Clicking the indicator is a fast path to open sharing settings to change volume or stop sharing.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7934.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.7939

Release date: Feb. 27, 2026

Released to: Dev Channel

For those who opted to receive the latest updates, this build gives administrators and Application Control for Business policy authors additional controls over the processing of batch files and CMD scripts. Starting with this release, admins can enable a more secure mode for processing batch files that ensures they do not change during execution by adding a value to the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Command Processor named LockBatchFilesWhenInUse (DWORD, value 0 or 1). Policy authors can also use the LockBatchFilesWhenInUse application manifest control documented here to enable this mode.

There are a variety of other improvements being rolled out gradually, including one in which a new taskbar indicator displays while you’re sharing, offering a quick reminder that audio is still being shared. Clicking the indicator is a fast path to open sharing settings to change volume or stop sharing.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.7939.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1673

Release date: Feb. 27, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel

For those who have opted to receive the latest updates, this build gets a variety of new features being rolled out gradually, including one in which Quick Machine Recovery (QMR) now turns on automatically for enterprise managed Windows Professional devices, as well as Windows Professional devices that are not domain-joined. These devices receive the same recovery features available to Windows Home users. For domain-joined devices, QMR stays off unless it is enabled by the organization.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1673.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7872

Release date: February 20, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build offers a variety of new features, including simplified specifications on the ‘Device info’ Card on the Settings Home page and improved mouseover animations for app groups on the taskbar.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7872.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.7877

Release date: February 20, 2026

Released to: Dev Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build offers a variety of new features, including simplified specifications on the ‘Device info’ Card on the Settings Home page and improved mouseover animations for app groups on the taskbar.

Several bugs have also been fixed, including one in which all File Explorer open windows and tabs unexpectedly jumped to Desktop or Home.

Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.7877.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1619

Release date: February 20, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build offers a variety of new features, including one in which Windows Hello Enhanced Sign-in Security (ESS) supports peripheral fingerprint sensors. Previously, ESS was only available on PCs with built-in biometric sensors, but now it can be used when you plug in a supported ESS fingerprint reader.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1619.)

Optional Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29531.1000

Release date: February 18, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel

This build is the first in a new Canary Channel optional path with a focus on platform development, which will introduce new features before the existing 28000 Canary Channel series. Microsoft recommends that most people remain on the 28000 build path, but adds that those who want to get the newest platform changes as early as possible may want to switch to this new 29500 path. Note, though, that if you switch to the 29500 path by installing this build, you won’t be able to go back to the 28000 Canary Channel series.

The build itself, in Microsoft’s words, “includes platform changes in moving to a new active development build.”

Microsoft warns, “because of the focus on platform development for this path, you may notice a temporary loss in some features that you have today. These features will return to this new active development build.”

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 29531.1000.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7859

Release date: February 17, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build displays an option to upgrade to a different Microsoft 365 plan on the Accounts page within the Settings app. It also rolls out fixes for several bugs, including one in which all File Explorer open windows and tabs unexpectedly jumped to Desktop or Home.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Preview Build 26220.7859.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Builds 26100.7918 and 26200.7918

Release date: February 17, 2026

Released to: Release Preview Channel

This build gradually rolls out a variety of new features, including one in which Quick Machine Recovery (QMR) now turns on automatically for Windows Professional devices that are not domain‑joined and not enrolled in enterprise endpoint management. These devices receive the same recovery features available to Windows Home users. For domain‑joined or enterprise managed devices, QMR stays off unless it is enabled by the organization. The build also improves login screen reliability.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Builds 26100.7918 and 26200.7918.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1611

Release date: February 12, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel

This build brings Sysmon functionality natively to Windows. Sysmon functionality allows you to capture system events that can help with threat detection, and you can use custom configuration files to filter the events you want to monitor. The captured events are written on the Windows event log, enabling them to be used with security applications and in a wide range of use cases.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1611.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7755

Release date: February 9, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build gradually rolls out several new features, including Emoji 16.0, which contains a new set of emojis, and the ability to directly control pan and tilt for supported cameras in the Settings app.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 226220.7755.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.7760

Release date: February 9, 2026

Released to: Dev Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build gradually rolls out several new features, including Emoji 16.0, which contains a new set of emojis, and the ability to directly control pan and tilt for supported cameras in the Settings app.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.7760.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1546

Release date: February 4, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel

This update, in the words of Microsoft, “includes a small set of general improvements and fixes that improve the overall experience for Insiders” running Windows.

It also fixes one bug that affected apps working with files stored on OneDrive or Dropbox.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1546.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7752

Release date: February 3, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

Those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates get Sysmon functionality natively in Windows. Sysmon functionality allows you to capture system events that can help with threat detection, and you can use custom configuration files to filter the events you want to monitor. The captured events are written on the Windows event log, enabling them to be used with security applications and a wide range of use cases. (This feature is being gradually rolled out.)

The same group also gets a number of bug fixes being gradually rolled out, including for a File Explorer bug in which icons/tooltips for “Add to favorites” were missing.

(Get more info about Insider Preview Build 26220.7752.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.7733

Release date: February 3, 2026

Released to: Dev Channel

Those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates get Sysmon functionality natively in Windows. Sysmon functionality allows you to capture system events that can help with threat detection, and you can use custom configuration files to filter the events you want to monitor. The captured events are written on the Windows event log, enabling them to be used with security applications and a wide range of use cases. (This feature is being gradually rolled out.)

The same group also gets a number of bug fixes being gradually rolled out, including for a File Explorer bug in which icons/tooltips for “Add to favorites” were missing.

(Get more info about Insider Preview Build 26300.7733.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1495

Release date: January 28, 2025

Released to: Canary Channel

This build, in Microsoft’s words, “includes a small set of general improvements and fixes that improve the overall experience [of Windows 11].” It also fixes a variety of bugs, including one that led to the Windows Update settings page hanging when loading.

The build has two known issues, one that sometimes causes all open File Explorer windows and tabs to unexpectedly jump to Desktop or Home in File Explorer, and another in which the desktop watermark is showing the wrong build number.

(Get more info about Insider Preview Build 28020.1495.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Builds 26100.7701 and 26200.7701

Release date: January 27, 2026

Released to: Release Preview Channel

This build gradually rolls out a variety of new features for Copilot+ PCs, including one in which Narrator gives you more control over how it announces on‑screen controls. You can choose which details are spoken and adjust their order to match how you navigate apps. These settings apply throughout the app to help reduce extra speech and make Narrator easier to follow.

The build also immediately rolls out a variety of new features for all PCs, including one in Data Protection Application Programming Interface (DPAPI) domain backup key management. Administrators can now set how often keys rotate automatically. This strengthens cryptographic security and reduces reliance on older encryption algorithms.

(Get more info about Insider Preview Builds 26100.7701 and 26200.7701.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7670

Release date: January 27, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build gradually rolls out several bug fixes, including for an issue in which the Search process was showing an icon with an X instead of a magnifying glass.

The build has five known issues, including one in which some Insiders’ apps aren’t showing in the system tray when they should be.

(Get more info about Insider Preview Build 26220.7670.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.7674

Release date: January 27, 2026

Released to: Dev Channel

In this build, the Dev Channel jumps ahead to receive 26300 series builds. This means that the window to switch from the Dev Channel to the Beta Channel is closed once Build 26300.7674is installed on your PC. This build for the Dev Channel is identical to the Windows 11 Build 26220.7653 release (see below).

(Get more info about Insider Preview Build 26300.7674.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7653

Release date: January 21, 2026

Released to: Dev Channel

This build for the Dev Channel is identical to the January 16th Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7653 released to the Beta Channel. See the writeup below for details.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7653.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7653

Release date: January 16, 2026

Released to: Beta Channel

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build gradually rolls out several changes, including one in which you can now set .webp images for your desktop background in Settings > Personalization > Desktop Background.

The same group also gets a number of bug fixes being gradually rolled out, including for a bug in which Settings crashed when interacting with audio devices.

The build has four known issues, including one in which some Insiders’ apps aren’t showing in the system tray when they should be.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7653.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1371 

Release date: January 14, 2026

Released to: Canary Channel

This build gradually rolls out a variety of bug fixes for those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, including a bug in which File Explorer showed a white flash when navigating between pages.

There is one known issue in this build: The desktop watermark shows the wrong build number.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1371.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7535

Release date: January 9, 2026

Released to: Dev & Beta Channels

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build gradually rolls out Copilot-powered image descriptions to Narrator on Copilot+ PCs, making it possible for blind and low-vision users to hear detailed, AI-generated descriptions of images, charts, and graphs.

The same group also gets a number of bug fixes being gradually rolled out, including for an issue in which File Explorer was causing explorer.exe to crash for some Insiders when invoking the context menu on the desktop.

The build has seven known issues, including one in which Settings crashes when interacting with audio devices.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7535.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7523

Release date: December 19, 2025

Released to: Dev & Beta Channels

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build gradually rolls out a version of Copilot on the taskbar tailored for commercial customers. It uses Work IQ as contextual information that they can reference in their Copilot chats and with Microsoft 365 AI agents. In addition, the build introduces Agent Launchers, a new framework that enables Windows apps to register AI agents and make them discoverable across the system.

The same group also gets a number of bug fixes being gradually rolled out, including one that addresses an issue in which File Explorer showed a white flash when navigating between pages.

The build has nine known issues, including one in which opening the context menu is causing explorer.exe to crash for some Insiders.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7523.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1362

Release date: December 15, 2025

Released to: Canary Channel

This build gradually rolls out several new features for Copilot+ PCs, including a streamlined design for the Click to Do context menu that makes frequently used actions like Copy, Save, Share, and Open easier to access. It also rolls out new features for all PCs, including improvements to the dark mode experience in File Explorer.

A variety of bug fixes are being gradually rolled out, including one for an issue in which Settings became unresponsive when attempting to navigate to the Network & Internet section.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28020.1362.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28000.1340 

Release date: December 9, 2025

Released to: Canary Channel

This build has, in Microsoft’s words, a “small set of general improvements and fixes” that improve Windows. It also enables more of the new features and improvements originally released with the October non-security preview update for Windows 11.

In addition, the build fixes a bug that caused some Storage Spaces to become inaccessible or Storage Spaces Direct to fail when creating a storage cluster.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28000.1340.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7344

Release date: December 5, 2025

Released to: Dev & Beta Channels

For those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build offers native support for the Model Context Protocol (MCP), an open standard that gives AI agents a universal way to connect with apps, tools, and services. Agents can discover and connect to these tools and other agents via a secure, manageable Windows on-device registry (ODR). By default, all agent connectors in the Windows ODR will be contained in a secure environment with their own identity and audit trail.

In addition, Quick machine recovery (QMR) will now be turned on automatically for Windows Professional devices that are not domain joined. These devices will get the same recovery features as Windows Home users. For enterprise computers that are domain joined, nothing changes — QMR will stay off unless your organization turns it on.

Those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates also get a number of bug fixes, including addressing a bug in which the search window to unexpectedly started floating above the taskbar.

The build has seven known issues, including one in which File Explorer shows a white flash when navigating between pages.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7344.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7271

Release date: November 21, 2025

Released to:  Dev & Beta Channels

This build introduces several features being rolled out gradually for those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates. These include point-in-time restore for Windows, which lets you to quickly roll your device back to a previous state to minimize downtime and simplify troubleshooting, and (on NPU devices) fluid dictation in voice typing, which automatically corrects grammar, punctuation, and filler words as you speak.

The build also expands the availability of the Xbox full-screen experience to additional Windows 11 PCs. You can add a controller to your PC for task switching and streamlined gaming on your desktop, laptop, or tablet.

Those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates also get several bug fixes, including one that resolves a hung taskbar after receiving certain notifications.

The build has seven known issues, including one in which File Explorer shows a white flash when navigating between pages.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7271.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28000.1199

Release date: November 18, 2025

Released to: Canary Channel

This build has, in Microsoft’s words, a “small set of general improvements and fixes” that improve Windows.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28000.1199.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Builds 26100.7296 and 26200.7296

Release date: November 17, 2025

Released to: Release Preview Channel

This update introduces a wide range of features being rolled out gradually, including several for Copilot+ PCs, such as Windows Studio Effects, which provide AI-powered camera enhancements on an additional, alternative camera such as a USB webcam or your laptop’s built-in rear camera.

All Windows 11 PCs get a variety of new features being gradually rolled out, including Windows Hello Enhanced Sign-in Security (ESS), now supporting peripheral fingerprint sensors. Also, on PCs with the settings “quick machine recovery” and “automatically check for solutions” both enabled, Quick Machine Recovery now runs a one‑time scan by default instead of repeating scans in a loop. If a fix isn’t available right away, QMR will quickly point you to the most appropriate recovery options to get you back up and running.

A bug fix is being immediately rolled out to all PCs to address an issue that affects Local Security Authority Subsystem Service (LSASS), when LSASS could become unstable due to an access violation.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Builds 26100.7296 and 26200.7296.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7262

Release date: November 17, 2025

Released to: Beta and Dev Channels

In this build, those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates get a variety of features being gradually rolled out, including using high-definition voices for English (US) in Narrator and Magnifier that use generative AI to adjust tone and pacing for more natural, expressive speech. Also rolling out is a new “Experimental agentic features” toggle in the Settings app that enables the creation of AI agent accounts and an agent workspace, and grants agentic apps access to your Documents, Downloads, Desktop, Music, Pictures, and Videos folders. (Find out more about experimental agentic features.)

The same group also gets a variety of bug fixes rolled out gradually, including for a bug in which the Task Manager process wasn’t stopping correctly after Task Manager was closed. As a result, Task Manager might have been unexpectedly open on boot.

There are four known issues in this build, including one in which the scrollbar and footer are missing in File Explorer and when text is scaled in the dark mode version of the copy dialog.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7262.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7070

Release date: November 7, 2025

Released to: Beta and Dev Channels

In this build, those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates get a variety of features being gradually rolled out, including the ability to choose your default dashboard in an updated Widget Board Settings.

Everyone gets an updated Quick Machine Recovery in Windows, which makes it easier and quicker to get back to a working PC. The experience in both Windows Settings and the Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) has been streamlined.

A variety of bug fixes are being rolled out gradually to those who have opted to receive the latest updates, including one that fixes a bug in which the “Automatically hide the taskbar” setting unexpectedly turned off after displaying a message saying, “a toolbar is already hidden on this side of your screen.”

There are five known issues in this build, including one in which the scrollbar and footer are missing in File Explorer when text is scaled in the dark mode version of the copy dialog.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7070.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28000

Release date: November 7, 2025

Released to: Canary Channel

This build has, in Microsoft’s words, a “small set of general improvements and fixes.” There are also a variety of bug fixes, including for a bug in which the credentials window was not accessible when trying to log in to Outlook.

There are two known issues in this build, one in which sleep and shutdown aren’t working correctly for some Insiders, and the other in which the new Start menu unexpectedly scrolls to the top.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28000.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27982

Release date: November 4, 2025

Released to: Canary Channel

This build gradually rolls out several new features, including one in which you can add, remove, and rearrange lock screen widgets such as Weather, Watchlist, and Sports on the lock screen. Windows also provides suggested widgets on the lock screen. To customize your lock screen widgets, go to Settings > Personalization > Lock screen.

Also new is a “drag tray” that appears at the top of your screen when you drag a local file from File Explorer or your desktop. You can drop the file into one of the displayed apps or select More to open the Windows share window.

A variety of bugs have been fixed, including one in which if you used your PC for a while without rebooting, explorer.exe might start crashing repeatedly.

There are two known issues in this build, one in which sleep and shutdown aren’t working correctly for some Insiders, and the other in which the new Start menu unexpectedly scrolls to the top.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27982.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7051

Release date: October 31, 2025

Released to: Beta and Dev Channels

In this build, those have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates get a variety of features being gradually rolled out, including Ask Copilot in the taskbar, which gives  you one-click access to Copilot Vision and Voice, so you can search via Copilot using text, voice, or guided support with Copilot Vision. As you type, results appear and update instantly. Turn it on by going to Settings > Personalization > Taskbar > Ask Copilot.  You can also manage whether the Copilot app launches automatically at sign-in using the “Auto start on log in” toggle in the Copilot app settings.

The same group gets a variety of bug fixes being rolled out gradually, including one to address an issue in which  interacting with a folder or its contents in Start menu could result in the folder becoming invisible.

There are four known issues in this build, including one in which the scrollbar and footer are missing in File Explorer when text is scaled in the dark mode version of the copy dialog.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7051.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.6982

Release date: October 24, 2025

Released to: Dev Channel

In this build, those have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates get a variety of changes being gradually rolled out, including Copy & Search, which allows you to search the text in your clipboard with a single click. When you copy text anywhere in Windows, a paste gleam will appear in your search box. Click on this gleam and your copied text will appear in the search field, allowing you to search instantly.

The same group gets a variety of bug fixes, including one for a bug in which the search icon in File Explorer sometimes infinitely looped in an animation.

There are five known issues in this build, including one in which the scrollbar and footer are missing in File Explorer when text is scaled in dark mode version of the copy dialog.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.6982.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27975 

Release date: October 23, 2025

Released to: Canary Channel

This build has, in Microsoft’s words, a “small set of general improvements and fixes” that improve Windows.

A variety of bugs have also been fixed, including one in which Settings crashed when accessing drive information under Settings > System > Storage. This also impacted accessing the drive information from the properties when you right-clicked a drive in File Explorer.

There are two known issues in this build, one in which sleep and shutdown aren’t working correctly for some Insiders, and the other in which the new Start menu unexpectedly scrolled to the top.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27975.)

Windows 11 Builds 26100.7015 and 26200.7015

Release date: October 21, 2025

Released to: Release Preview Channel

This update includes a wide variety of new features being rolled out gradually, including a redesigned Start menu that includes a scrollable All section, has new category and grid views, and which adapts to your screen size. The build also includes new features for Click to Do, which can now translate text into other languages. File Explorer now has a recommended files feature that shows content such as files you frequently use, have recently downloaded, or have added to your File Explorer Gallery.

Two bugs are fixed in this build: one that caused an ACCESS_DENIED error when users attempted to change passwords remotely on member servers or workgroup devices, even when they had the required permissions, and another in which protected content playback failed on some machines after installing KB506408.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Builds 26100.7015 and 26200.7015.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.6972

Release date: October 17, 2025

Released to: Dev Channel

In this build, those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates get a new feature being rolled out slowly, which lets you add and manage your mobile devices from Settings by navigating to “Mobile Devices” under the Bluetooth & Devices section. The page allows you to view your mobile devices, add new mobile devices, and manage features such as using your device as a connected camera or accessing your device’s files in File Explorer.

Those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates get two bug fixes being rolled out slowly, one for a bug that caused File Explorer to show a Catastrophic Error (0x8000FFFF) when extracting large (1.5GB+) archive files, and another that sometimes caused an old white toolbar to randomly appear in File Explorer.

There are five known issues in this build, including one in which the scrollbar and footer are missing in File Explorer when text is scaled in the copy dialog in dark mode.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.6972.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27971 

Release date: October 16, 2025

Released to: Canary Channel

In this build, the Notification Center can be used on secondary monitors. You’ll be able to see your calendar on any of your monitors and open Notification Center on any of them by clicking the date and time in the system tray of your taskbar. Note that this functionality will be rolled out gradually.

A variety of bugs have been fixed, including one in which File Explorer crashed when transferring files to a network drive.

There are three known issues in this build, including one in which sleep and shutdown aren’t working correctly for some Insiders.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27971.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26120.6780 

Release date: October 10, 2025

Released to: Beta Channel

In this build, those with Copilot+ PCs who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates get a handful of changes and new features, including one in Settings in which more results appear in the search flyout and let you quickly modify the settings you’re searching for.

Those with any PCs who have turned the toggle on get several changes, including a new OneDrive icon in Accounts and Homepages in Settings, and the return of the ability to enable Administrator Protection via Windows Security under Account protection.

The same group gets a variety of bug fixes, including one for an issue in the previous flight in which File Explorer frequently crashed, and another that was causing the Start menu to unexpectedly scroll to the top when interacting with it.

There are four known issues in this build, including one in which the scrollbar and footer are missing in File Explorer when text is scaled in the copy dialog in dark mode.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26120.6780.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.6780 

Release date: October 10, 2025

Released to: Dev Channel

This update is identical to Build 26120.6780 for the Beta Channel, detailed above.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.6780.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27965

Release date: October 8, 2025

Released to: Canary Channel

This update introduces a new scrollable Start menu, with “All” on the top level, so apps are accessible without having to navigate to a secondary page. There are also new category and grid views to browse and launch your installed apps in the “All” section. The new menu adapts its size based on your device’s screen size.

There are also several bug fixes, including one in which the taskbar was not autohiding correctly.

There are four known issues in this build, including one in which Settings may crash when accessing drive information under Settings > System > Storage. This also impacts accessing the drive information from the properties when you right-click a drive in File Explorer.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27965.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27959

Release date: October 6, 2025

Released to: Canary Channel

This update introduces the option to move the hardware indicators for brightness, volume, airplane mode, and virtual desktops to different positions on your screen, including the current bottom position and new top-left and top-center positions.

There are also a variety of bug fixes, including for one in which icons and text sometimes overlapped on the desktop when using increased text scaling.

There is one known issue in this build, in which sleep and shutdown aren’t working correctly for some Insiders.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27959.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26120.6772

Release date: October 6, 2025

Released to: Beta Channel

In this build, those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates get a variety of new features, including Image Object select for Click to Do in Copilot+ PCs, in which you can   hover over your image to preview selectable areas. Once selected, you can copy and paste your object into other apps or use it to kick off a chat with Copilot. Also included are improvements to dark mode for File Explorer for all PCs and the ability to use peripheral fingerprint sensors with Windows Hello. These changes are rolling out gradually.

The same group gets a variety of bugs fixed, including one in which Encrypted File System (EFS) related dialogs in File Explorer weren’t responding to increased text scaling. The bug fixes are rolling out gradually.

There are five known issues in this build, including one in which some searches may show unexpected text instead of the expected results and images.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26120.6772.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26120.6772 

Release date: October 6, 2025

Released to: Dev Channel

This update is identical to Build 26120.6772, detailed above.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26120.6772.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26120.6760

Release date: September 29, 2025

Released to: Beta Channel

In this build, those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates get a variety of new features, including the ability to do a network speed test straight from the taskbar. You can launch it via the Wi-Fi and Cellular Quick Settings pages or by right-clicking the network icon in the system tray. The tool opens in your default browser and supports testing Ethernet, Wi-Fi, and cellular connections. It helps in assessing network performance and troubleshooting.

The same group gets a variety of bug fixes, including for an issue in which the battery icon got out of sync with the actual charging state — for example, it would show that you weren’t plugged in when you were.

Everyone in the Beta Channel gets a variety of bug fixes, including one for developers that addresses an issue in which PIX on Windows was unable to play back GPU captures. 

There are six known issues in this build, including one in which some searches may show unexpected text instead of the expected results and images.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26120.6760.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.6760 

Release date: September 29, 2025

Released to: Dev Channel

This build is for those who have already upgraded to Windows 11 version 25H2.

In this build, those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates get a variety of new features, including the ability to do a network speed test straight from the taskbar. You can launch it via the Wi-Fi and Cellular Quick Settings pages or by right-clicking the network icon in the system tray. The tool opens in your default browser and supports testing Ethernet, Wi-Fi, and cellular connections. It helps in assessing network performance and troubleshooting.

The same group gets a variety of bug fixes, including for an issue in which the battery icon got out of sync with the actual charging state — for example, it would show that you weren’t plugged in when you were.

Everyone in the Dev Channel gets a variety of bug fixes, including one for developers that addresses an issue in which PIX on Windows was unable to play back GPU captures. 

There are six known issues in this build, including one in which some searches may show unexpected text instead of the expected results and images.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.6760.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27954

Release date: September 25, 2025

Released to: Canary Channel

This build includes, in Microsoft’s words, “a small set of general improvements and fixes that improve the overall experience for Insiders running” Windows. It also includes fixes one bug in which you might not be able to connect to shared files and folders if you were using the Server Message Block (SMB) v1 protocol on NetBIOS over TCP/IP NetBIOS (NetBT) after the latest updates.

There is one known issue in this build, in which PIX on Windows is unable to play back GPU captures on this OS version. This will be addressed by a new PIX release, estimated to arrive by the end of September. In the meantime, if you are affected, you can use the “Send Feedback” button in PIX or contact Microsoft on the DirectX Discord server and get help via private builds.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27954.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26120.6690

Release date: September 19, 2025

Released to: Beta Channel

For those who have Copilot+ PCs and have turned on a toggle to receive the latest update, this build gradually rolls out several new features, including one in which Click to Do can let users translate on-screen text with just a few clicks. 

All PCs that have turned a toggle on to receive the latest updates get a variety of bug fixes rolled out gradually, including one in which File Explorer became unresponsive if a UNC server name was directly typed into address bar. There are 10 known issues in this build, including one in which the placeholder text in the Settings search box may appear vertically misaligned.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26120.6690.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.6690

Release date: September 19, 2025

Released to: Dev Channel

This build is for those who have already upgraded to Windows 11 version 25H2. 

For those who have Copilot+ PCs and have turned on a toggle to receive the latest update, this build gradually rolls out several new features, including one in which Click to Do can let you translate on-screen text with just a few clicks. 

All PCs which have turned a toggle on to receive the latest updates get a variety of bug fixes rolled out gradually, including one in which File Explorer became unresponsive if a UNC server name was directly typed into address bar. There are 10 known issues in this build, including one in which the placeholder text in the Settings search box may appear vertically misaligned.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.6690.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27950

Release date: September 19, 2025

Released to: Canary Channel

This build includes, in Microsoft’s words, “a small set of general improvements and fixes that improve the overall experience for Insiders running” Windows. In addition, Advanced Settings will revert to the previous “For Developers” experience after updating to this build. 

There are also a number of bug fixes, including one in which the app preview windows in the taskbar became misaligned (away from the app icon you’d clicked / hovered over) after a display resolution change. 

There are two known issues in this build, including one for developers in which PIX on Windows is unable to play back GPU captures. This will be addressed by a new PIX release, estimated to arrive by the end of September. In the meantime, anyone impacted can use the “Send Feedback” button in PIX or contact Microsoft on the DirectX Discord server and Microsoft can help provide private builds.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27950.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Builds 26100.6713 and 26200.6713

Release date: September 12, 2025

Released to: Release Preview Channel

Build 26100.6713 is for those on Windows 11 24H2, and 26200.6713 is for those on Windows 25H2.

These builds gradually roll out a large number of new features, including AI actions in File Explorer for editing images or summarizing documents, and the ability to pin favorite apps in the Windows share window to quickly access them when you need them.

The builds fix several bugs immediately, including one that disrupted Windows Update for those using Windows Server Update Services (WSUS). Additionally, several bug fixes are being gradually rolled out, including for a bug in which when Windows Sandbox was enabled, the VmmemCmFirstBoot process may have consumed large amounts of CPU after login, causing your PC to become unresponsive.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Builds 26100.6713 and 26200.6713.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26120.6682

Release date: September 12, 2025

Released to: Beta Channel

For those who have Copilot+ PCs and have turned the toggle on to receive the latest update, this build gradually rolls out a new Copilot prompt box in Click to Do designed to streamline interaction with Microsoft Copilot.

New emoji from Emoji 16.0 are being gradually rolled out in the emoji panel for those who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates.

The same group also gets a variety of bug fixes rolled out gradually, including for one that caused some PCs to bug check (green screen) while hibernating, and another in which the Shared section in File Explorer Home was visible even if there was no content to display.

There are seven known issues in this build, including one in which the placeholder text in the Settings search box may appear vertically misaligned.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26120.6682.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.6682

Release date: September 12, 2025

Released to: Dev Channel

This build is for those who have already upgraded to Windows 11 version 25H2.

For those who have Copilot+ PCs and have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates, this build gradually rolls out a new Copilot prompt box in Click to Do designed to streamline interaction with Microsoft Copilot. New emoji from Emoji 16.0 are also being gradually rolled out to the same group.

The same group also gets a variety of bug fixes rolled out gradually, including for one that caused some PCs to bug check (green screen) while hibernating, and another in which the Shared section in File Explorer Home was visible even if there was no content to display.

There are seven known issues in this build, including one in which the placeholder text in the Settings search box may appear vertically misaligned.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.6682.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27943

Release date: September 11, 2025

Released to: Canary Channel

This build includes, in Microsoft’s words, “a small set of general improvements and fixes that improve the overall experience for Insiders running” Windows.

There are also a number of bug fixes, including for a bug that caused Settings > System > Storage > Temporary files to get stuck when scanning files. This issue also caused the entry to clean up previous Windows Installations to not show in Storage Settings.

There are five known issues in this build, including one in which audio stops working and Device Manager shows one or more devices with a yellow exclamation mark, including “ACPI Audio Compositor” and others. Selecting Properties on these devices will show “Windows cannot load the device driver for this hardware. The driver may be corrupted or missing.”

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27943.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27938

Release date: September 8, 2025

Released to: Canary Channel

This build introduces AI actions into File Explorer. These offer new capabilities when you right-click a file, such as editing a graphic or summarizing a Word document. For now, there are four of them, all related to image files. You can perform a Bing search based on an image file, blur the background in an image, erase objects in an image, and remove the background in an image.

A number of bugs have been fixed, including one that caused Task Manager to freeze when going to the performance section, and another in which the red color used for a low space drive in This PC was unexpectedly light colored.

The build has five known issues, including one in which audio stops working and Device Manager shows one or more devices with a yellow exclamation mark.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27938.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26120.5790 

Release date: September 5, 2025

Released to: Beta Channel

For those who have Copilot+ PCs, this build introduces fluid dictation, which makes voice-based dictation easier. It automatically corrects grammar, punctuation, and filler words as you speak, reducing the need for manual editing. In addition, being rolled out on supported Copilot+ PCs is the ability to use Studio Effect’s AI-powered camera enhancements with an additional, alternative camera — such as a USB webcam or your laptop’s built-in rear camera.

Those in the Beta Channel who have turned the toggle on to receive the latest updates get new on-hover actions in File Manager Home for faster file management.

The same group also gets a variety of bug fixes rolled out gradually, including one for a bug in which the right-click context menu in File Explorer sometimes unexpectedly switched back and forth between the normal initial view and “Show more options” with each right-click when certain apps were installed.

There are five known issues in this build, including one in which for some users, the Shared section in File Explorer Home may be visible even if there is no content to display.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26120.5790.)

Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.5790 

Release date: September 5, 2025

Released to: Dev Channel

This build appears to be identical to Build 26120.5790 for the Beta Channel, detailed above.

(Get more info about Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.5790.)

Long before Taco Tuesday became part of the pop-culture vernacular, Tuesdays were synonymous with security — and for anyone in the tech world, they still are.  Patch Tuesday, as you most likely know, refers to the day each month when Microsoft releases security updates and patches for its software products — everything from Windows to Office to SQL Server, developer tools to browsers.

The practice, which happens on the second Tuesday of the month, was initiated to streamline the patch distribution process and make it easier for users and IT system administrators to manage updates.  Like tacos, Patch Tuesday is here to stay.

In a blog post celebrating the 20th anniversary of Patch Tuesday, the Microsoft Security Response Center wrote: “The concept of Patch Tuesday was conceived and implemented in 2003. Before this unified approach, our security updates were sporadic, posing significant challenges for IT professionals and organizations in deploying critical patches in a timely manner.”

Patch Tuesday will continue to be an “important part of our strategy to keep users secure,” Microsoft said, adding that it’s now an important part of the cybersecurity industry.  As a case in point, Adobe, among others, follows a similar patch cadence.

Patch Tuesday coverage has also long been a staple of Computerworld’s commitment to provide critical information to the IT industry. That’s why we’ve gathered together this collection of recent patches, a rolling list we’ll keep updated each month.

In case you missed a recent Patch Tuesday announcement, here are the latest six months of updates.

For June, Patch Tuesday means an IT scramble

Microsoft this month released 206 updates affecting Windows, Office, Exchange Server, and its developer tools — including three Windows vulnerabilities already publicly disclosed. That trio includes an elevation of privilege in the Collaborative Translation Framework (CVE-2026-45586), a denial of service in HTTP.sys (CVE-2026-49160), and a BitLocker security feature bypass (CVE-2026-50507). At the moment, none appear to be under active exploitation, but all three are rated “Exploitation More Likely.” 

Even without an exploited zero-day, the June 2026 Patch Tuesday release requires Patch Now recommendations for Windows, Office, and Exchange. The latter is back in the patch picture with a consolidated security update that Microsoft recommends installing “as soon as possible.”

More info is available here on Microsoft Security updates for June 2026.

For May, Patch Tuesday means 139 updates — but no zero-days

Microsoft this month released 139 updates affecting Windows, Office, .NET, and SQL Server (though there were no updates for Microsoft Exchange Server). Despite the absence of zero-days, the May Patch Tuesday update still requires Patch Now recommendations for Windows and Office. 

The combination of three unauthenticated network RCEs (Netlogon, DNS Client, and SSO Plugin for Jira and Confluence), four Word Preview Pane RCEs, the large TCP/IP vulnerability cluster, and the carry-over BitLocker recovery condition (still active on Windows 10 and Windows Server) warrants an accelerated deployment release schedule. 

More info is available here on Microsoft Security updates for May 2026.

Microsoft’s Patch Tuesday release for April is a whopper

Windows admins are going to be busy this month, dealing with the largest Patch Tuesday cycle in memory. The April release involves 165 updates and roughly 340 unique CVEs from Microsoft — including two zero-days, one of which is already being actively exploited in the wild. 

The Readiness team recommends “Patch Now” schedules for nearly every major product family: Windows, Office (with a zero-day), Microsoft Edge (Chromium), SQL Server, and Microsoft Developer Tools (.NET). April also brings Phase 2 of Microsoft’s Kerberos RC4 hardening with full enforcement set for July. There is a lot to cover, so here’s a useful infographic mapping the deployment risk for each platform.

More info is available here on Microsoft Security updates for April 2026.

For March, Patch Tuesday delivers fixes for 83 vulnerabilities

Microsoft’s March Patch Tuesday release addresses 83 vulnerabilities across Windows, Office, SQL Server, Azure, and .NET — with two publicly disclosed zero-days affecting SQL Server and .NET (though neither is being actively exploited in the wild.) Six additional vulnerabilities spanning the Windows Kernel, Graphics Component, SMB Server, Accessibility Infrastructure, and Winlogon are flagged as “Exploitation More Likely.”

The most significant change this month is the introduction of Common Log File System (CLFS) hardening with signature verification, which will affect how Windows handles log files across the operating system. More info on Microsoft Security updates for March 2026.

February’s Patch Tuesday release fixes 59 flaws, including 6 being exploited

The company’s Patch Tuesday release for February addresses 59 CVEs across the company’s product family — roughly half the volume of January’s 159 patches. Six vulnerabilities, affecting Windows Shell, MSHTML, Desktop Window Manager, Remote Desktop, Remote Access, and Microsoft Word, are already being actively exploited. (All five Critical-rated CVEs target Azureservices rather than Windows, however.) 

Both Windows and Office get a “Patch Now” recommendation, with CISA setting a March 3 enforcement deadline for all six exploited vulnerabilities. Two new enforcement timelines also take effect in April: Kerberos RC4 deprecation (CVE-2026-20833) and Windows Deployment Services hardening (CVE-2026-0386). More info on Microsoft Security updates for February 2026.

For January, Patch Tuesday starts off with a bang

The first Patch Tuesday release of 2026 addresses 112 CVEs across Microsoft’s product portfolio, including eight rated critical and three zero-day vulnerabilities. One zero-day (CVE-2026-20805), an information disclosure flaw in the Desktop Window Manager, is already under active exploitation, prompting CISA to add it to the Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog with a remediation deadline of Feb. 3, 2026. (Note: 95 of the vulnerabilities affect Windows.) More info on Microsoft Security updates for January 2026.

Microsoft this week released 206 updates affecting Windows, Office, Exchange Server, and its developer tools —  including three Windows vulnerabilities already publicly disclosed. That trio includes an elevation of privilege in the Collaborative Translation Framework (CVE-2026-45586), a denial of service in HTTP.sys (CVE-2026-49160), and a BitLocker security feature bypass (CVE-2026-50507). At the moment, none appear to be under active exploitation, but all three are rated “Exploitation More Likely.” 

Even without an exploited zero-day, the June 2026 Patch Tuesday release requires Patch Now recommendations for Windows, Office, and Exchange. The latter is back in the patch picture with a consolidated security update that Microsoft recommends installing “as soon as possible.” 

The Readiness team suggests testing start with domain controllers, Hyper-V hosts, anything self-hosting on HTTP.sys, and Outlook-heavy desktops —  in that order. To help navigate these changes, here’s a useful infographic detailing the risks of deploying the updates to each platform.

(More information about recent Patch Tuesday releases is available here.)

Known issues

This June release note from Microsoft flags known issues with three updates:

• KB5094128 — BitLocker recovery prompt on first restart (Windows Server 2022). The PCR7 condition we have tracked since April is still live on the platforms that did not receive May’s Boot Manager servicing fix. Devices with BitLocker enabled on the OS drive, the Group Policy “Configure TPM platform validation profile for native UEFI firmware configurations” set with PCR7 included, and System Information reporting Secure Boot State PCR7 Binding as “Not Possible” may prompt for the recovery key on the first restart after installing this update.
• KB5094127 — Windows 10 21H2/22H2. The release note carries a known-issue flag, too, with Windows 10 in the same boat as Server 2022: it has not received the Boot Manager servicing improvement that closed the BitLocker/PCR7 recovery condition on Windows 11. So, that same Group Policy configuration remains the trigger to check before deployment.
• KB5094125/KB5094128 — WSUS synchronization error details suppressed (Windows Server 2025 and 2022). WSUS no longer displays synchronization error details in its reporting. This is deliberate: the functionality was “temporarily removed to address the Remote Code Execution Vulnerability, CVE-2025-59287.” Microsoft offered no workaround.

One continuing advisory from May remains in effect: Windows Update can still replace manually installed graphics drivers with older OEM versions from the Windows Update catalogue.

Major revisions and mitigations

Unlike last month, this patch cycle delivered two genuine revisions and a cluster of out-of-band fixes that require action:

• Microsoft Teams Spoofing (CVE-2026-32185) — revised to version 3.0 on May 21. Microsoft announced the availability of the security update for Teams for Android; customers running affected versions should install it. If your mobile fleet runs Android, this is the action item.
• Microsoft Defender out-of-band cluster (May 19–21) — a Critical remote code execution flaw (CVE-2026-45584), plus an elevation of privilege (CVE-2026-41091) and a denial of service (CVE-2026-45498).
• SharePoint RCE (CVE-2026-45659) — a separate out-of-band fix also posted on May 21. SharePoint admins had three distinct security notices in a fortnight. The recommendation: deploy these clustered but separate patches as a single unit.

Interestingly, there were two omissions from last month’s list:

• SharePoint Server RCE (CVE-2026-47294) — published May 29 with the note that it “was addressed by updates that were released in May 2026, but the CVE was inadvertently omitted from the May 2026 Security Updates.”
• Windows DWM Core Library Information Disclosure (CVE-2026-48566) — also fixed in May, also left off the May list.

That makes two months running: the Patch Tuesday list is never final. The June release itself also carried a substantive revision:

• Remote Desktop cluster re-issued for Windows 11 26H1 — five RDP/RDS CVEs from 2024–2025, including two Critical RCEs (CVE-2024-49123, CVE-2024-49132) and the RDP Server RCE (CVE-2024-43582). If you are running 26H1, the June cumulative closes these older CVEs.

Windows lifecycle and enforcement updates

Given the month SharePoint just had, SharePoint 2016/2019 require some of the cycle’s most active patching on a platform with one update left. If migration is not already in progress, July’s final update is the deadline. Here are the other key dates:

• The 2011 KEK CA expires on June 24, and the UEFI CA for third-party boot loaders follows three days later, with the Windows Production PCA for the boot manager coming up October. 19. Devices that have not taken the Windows UEFI CA 2023 key updates under CVE-2023-24932 lose the ability to receive updated boot components once the certificates lapse. This is a big deal.
• With just one Patch Tuesday to go, SharePoint Server 2016 and 2019, Project Server 2016 and 2019, SQL Server 2016, and SQL Server 2014 ESU Year 2 all reach end of support on July 14. (InfoPath 2013, SharePoint Designer 2013, and Visual Studio 2022 17.12 LTSC go with them.)
• Kerberos RC4 hardening (CVE-2026-20833) moves from default-hardening to its enforcement phase next month. Accounts still depending on RC4 service tickets have weeks, not months.
• The graphics-driver targeting change (four-part to two-part Hardware IDs) pilots to September 2026, with broader enforcement planned for Q4 2026 to Q1 2027; until then, Windows Update can still downgrade manually installed display drivers.

This month’s release is a security-only release with a clear feature focus: the Remote Desktop client. The Remote Desktop ActiveX control (mstscax.dll) is the most patched component this cycle with five separate updates (see below). 

The secondary theme is Windows authentication, with three updates to the NTLM security package. Every Windows binary this month reports no functional changes, so the work is pure regression validation. Lower-risk patches reach DHCP, telephony, Hyper-V, UDF and Projected File System storage, and the graphics stack.

Remote Desktop client

The Remote Desktop client (mstscax.dll) draws a high-risk flag that lands specifically on printer redirection — the path that maps a client’s local printers into a remote session. A regression here typically shows as missing redirected printers, failed print jobs, or a hang on connect or reconnect. The wider Remote Desktop stack is also updated, including RemoteApp and clipboard redirection (rdpclip.exe, RdpCoreTS.dll) and Remote Desktop Licensing (lserver.dll). So, be sure to validate connection, session, and licensing together.

A passing run is a remote session that connects, redirects printers, prints, and survives a reconnect with no crashes or missing devices.

• Connect with Remote Desktop Connection (mstsc.exe) to a test host, enable printer redirection in Local Resources, and confirm redirected printers appear in the session.
• Print a test page from an app in the session to a redirected printer; repeat with two or more client printers installed.
• Disconnect and reconnect the session, then confirm the redirected printers are still present and usable.
• Repeat the printer test in both a full desktop session and a RemoteApp session.
• Exercise general remote access: connect through a Remote Desktop Gateway, use VMConnect to reach a VM, and verify clipboard and device redirection.
• On a Remote Desktop Licensing server, confirm clients connect with licensing enabled, across Per User and Per Device modes.

Windows authentication (NTLM)

Three updates touch the NTLM security support provider (msv1\_0.dll), the module behind network authentication when Kerberos is not used. Authentication changes are regression-sensitive: the failure modes are logon failures, broken file-share or RDP access, and application sign-in problems. Validate across domain-joined and workgroup machines.

• Sign in to domain-joined and standalone machines with domain, local, and cached credentials after a reboot.
• Access SMB file shares by host name and IP, including paths that fall back to NTLM, and confirm authenticated reads and writes.
• Authenticate to a Remote Desktop host and to line-of-business applications that rely on integrated Windows authentication.
• Watch the Security event log for new logon-failure or audit anomalies during the test window.

Other Windows components

The remaining updates carry no functional changes, so cover them with routine regression by area.

• Networking: exercise DHCP lease, renewal, and release on IPv4 and IPv6 (dhcpcore), sustained socket traffic over the WinSock driver (afd.sys, two updates), HTTP.sys request handling under IIS, and TAPI telephony integrations (tapisrv.dll).
• Virtualization: boot Generation 1 and Generation 2 VMs, including nested virtualization, to cover the Hyper-V hypervisor (hvix64/hvax64), and connect a VM through an external virtual switch (toggling NIC RSS) to cover vmswitch.sys.
• Storage and filesystems: read and write UDF-formatted media (udfs.sys), exercise the Projected File System minifilter (prjflt.sys), and validate cloud files hydration and Work Folders sync (cldflt.sys, workfolders.exe), including a ReFS volume with BitLocker enabled.
• Graphics and shell: run GPU-accelerated and 2D rendering workloads to cover Direct2D (d2d1.dll), GDI+ (gdiplus.dll), the Desktop Window Manager (dwmcore.dll), the Windows Imaging Component (windowscodecs.dll), and UI Automation (UiaManager.dll); watch for artifacts and accessibility regressions.
• Notifications and input: open apps that raise toast and push notifications (wpnapps.dll, wpncore.dll) and verify Text Services Framework input across keyboard layouts and IMEs (msctf.dll).

Microsoft Office & SharePoint

June’s Office updates are MSI editions only: Excel 2016 (KB5002877), Word 2016 (KB5002879), Office 2016 shared components (KB5002878, KB5002852, and the rich-edit control KB5002578), and Office Online Server 2019 (KB5002875). The shared Office 2016 component updates also apply to the SharePoint Server 2016, 2019, and Subscription Edition baselines. No Critical non-security client release ships this cycle, and Click-to-Run estates are unaffected.

• Open complex Excel workbooks with formulas, macros, and external data connections; save and reopen to verify integrity.
• Edit Word documents with embedded objects, tracked changes, and rich formatting that exercises the rich-edit control.
• On the SharePoint Server baselines (2016, 2019, Subscription Edition) and Office Online Server, validate document library operations, co-authoring, and browser-based viewing and editing.
• Confirm that Office add-ins and line-of-business integrations continue to operate.

Developer tools and databases

June’s fixes update the .NET SDK across the 8.0, 9.0, and 10.0 servicing lines (8.0.422, 9.0.315, 10.0.301), and ships SQL Server GDR security updates spanning SQL Server 2016 SP3 through SQL Server 2025, in both RTM+GDR and cumulative-update+GDR branches.

• After installing the .NET SDK update, build and run representative applications and confirm existing projects compile and execute normally.
• For SQL Server, install the GDR update onto the matching baseline or cumulative-update branch, then restart the service and run standard transactions.
• Verify a backup and restore, confirm Always On availability groups stay healthy, and test patch install and removal on each servicing branch.

The Readiness team suggests that this month’s testing lead with Remote Desktop. The client is both the most-patched component and the sole High Risk item, so give it a focused regression pass centered on printer redirection, then broaden to general connectivity, RemoteApp, clipboard and device redirection, gateway access, and licensing. 

The NTLM authentication updates are the second priority: validate domain and standalone logon, file-share access, and application sign-in. Everything else is a no-functional-change security update, so cover networking, Hyper-V, storage, and graphics with routine regression. Office is MSI-only, with Click-to-Run untouched, and the .NET and SQL Server updates round out the developer and database estate.

Each month, we break down the update cycle into product families (as defined by Microsoft) with the following basic groupings:

Browsers

Microsoft Edge released the stable version (149.0.4022.52) on June 4, per the Edge security release notes. Nothing ships for Internet Explorer, which remains retired. This cycle is unusually lopsided: just one Edge-engineered CVE against a very large Chromium upstream flow:

• CVE-2026-47644 — Copilot Chat (Microsoft Edge) — Information disclosure (CVSS 6.5, rated critical). For the second month running, Copilot Chat in Edge supplies the headline browser issue (May’s was CVE-2026-33111); Microsoft addresses the Copilot service component, with the browser update completing the fix.
• Chromium upstream — 407 CVEs relayed through MSRC this cycle, spanning the weekly Chrome release cadence since the May report: use-after-free, out-of-bounds read/write, type confusion, and policy bypass across V8, Blink, PDFium, WebRTC, ANGLE, and DevTools. The same fixes ship in the Chrome Stable channel; see the Chrome release blog for the upstream notes.

The Chromium volume looks alarming but is routine plumbing —  it flows to Edge through its own auto-update channel. Add these updates to your standard release schedule for Edge-managed environments.

Windows

Microsoft addressed 119 vulnerabilities in Windows this month, 22 rated critical and 97, important —  nearly double May’s count. Elevation of privilege again dominates by volume (49 entries), followed by remote code execution (28), information disclosure (16), security feature bypass (15), denial of service (6), and a handful of spoofing and tampering entries. All three of June’s publicly disclosed zero-days land here:

• CVE-2026-45586 — Collaborative Translation Framework (CTFMON) — Elevation of privilege (CVSS 7.8, publicly disclosed).
• CVE-2026-49160 — HTTP.sys — Denial of service (CVSS 7.5, publicly disclosed).
• CVE-2026-50507 — BitLocker — Security feature bypass (CVSS 6.8, publicly disclosed) —  BitLocker’s third entry this month, keeping it on the radar alongside the PCR7 known issue.

At the feature level, the critical risks are concentrated in nine areas:

• Remote Desktop Client — the largest single cluster: 11 CVEs, 7 rated critical, led by CVE-2026-47289 and CVE-2026-42985 (both CVSS 8.8, the latter “Exploitation More Likely”).
• Windows Kernel — CVE-2026-45657, remote code execution at CVSS 9.8, the joint-highest Windows score this cycle.
• HTTP.sys — CVE-2026-47291, unauthenticated remote code execution (CVSS 9.8, “Exploitation More Likely”) in the kernel-mode web server underpinning IIS, WinRM, and anything self-hosting on http.sys — paired with the disclosed DoS above.
• DHCP Client — CVE-2026-44815, remote code execution at CVSS 9.8.
• Active Directory Domain Services — CVE-2026-45648, remote code execution (CVSS 8.8) on the directory itself, with the Kerberos KDC adding a separate critical RCE (CVE-2026-47288).
• Hyper-V — three critical RCEs (CVE-2026-45607, CVE-2026-45641, CVE-2026-47652, up to CVSS 8.4) — guest-to-host risk on virtualization hosts.
• Windows Graphics Component — two critical RCEs (CVE-2026-44803, CVE-2026-44812, CVSS 7.8), both “Exploitation More Likely” vulnerabilities reachable through Office rendering paths.
• Windows Deployment Services — CVE-2026-42987, remote code execution (CVSS 8.1).
• Cryptographic Services and Device Health Attestation — critical elevation-of-privilege entries (CVE-2026-44810, CVSS 8.4; CVE-2026-33828, CVSS 7.8) in trust-anchor components.

Given the publicly disclosed vulnerabilities this month, add this Windows update to your Patch Now schedule.

Office

Microsoft released 53 Office CVEs this month — 10 critical, 43 important. Remote code execution again leads (24 entries), but the surprise is spoofing at 20 entries, almost all of it SharePoint. (SharePoint Server appears in 30 of the 53 CVEs this cycle.) The rest split across information disclosure (6), elevation of privilege (2), and a security feature bypass.

• Microsoft has addressed seven critical remote code execution entries, each CVSS 8.4, each with the Preview Pane confirmed as an attack vector: CVE-2026-45456, CVE-2026-45458, and CVE-2026-47635 against Outlook and Word, plus CVE-2026-45461, CVE-2026-45463, CVE-2026-45472, and CVE-2026-45474 against Office broadly.

Add these Office updates to your Patch Now deployment, prioritizing Outlook-heavy desktops and SharePoint farms.

Microsoft Exchange and SQL Server

The pattern inverts from May: SQL Server receives nothing (no patches at all), while Exchange Server — absent in May — returns with a consolidated security update carrying seven CVEs for on-premises builds (Exchange Server 2016 CU23 and Exchange Server 2019), plus one cloud-side critical:

• CVE-2026-45504 — Exchange Server — Elevation of privilege (CVSS 8.8). The headline on-premises entry.
• CVE-2026-45503 and CVE-2026-47631 — Exchange Server — Information disclosure and spoofing, each CVSS 8.1.
• CVE-2026-45583 — Exchange Server — Remote code execution (CVSS 7.5), with three further spoofing/information-disclosure entries (CVE-2026-45500, CVE-2026-45501, CVE-2026-45502) rounding out the set.
• CVE-2026-48579 — Exchange Online — Information disclosure (CVSS 9.1, rated critical) —  addressed service-side, no customer action.

Microsoft also revised the May Exchange spoofing entry (CVE-2026-42897) to point at this same June security update, with the recommendation to install “as soon as possible.” Add the June Exchange SU to your Patch Now schedule.

Developer tools

Microsoft released 10 CVEs across its developer tooling this month, all rated important —  though the top score outranks most of this cycle’s criticals, and the concentration in Visual Studio Code (seven of 10 entries) continues last month’s pattern:

• Visual Studio Code — seven entries led by CVE-2026-47281, an elevation of privilege at CVSS 9.6 —  the highest developer-tools score in months. Behind it: CVE-2026-45482, a security feature bypass in the GitHub Copilot Chat extension (CVSS 8.4); CVE-2026-47292, remote code execution in the MSSQL extension (CVSS 7.8); a second elevation of privilege (CVE-2026-40376, CVSS 7.5); and security-feature-bypass, tampering, and information-disclosure entries (CVE-2026-48569, CVE-2026-47287, CVE-2026-47284).
• Microsoft .NET on Windows has three entries: CVE-2026-45490, a .NET SDK elevation of privilege (CVSS 7.8) across .NET 8.0, 9.0, and 10.0; CVE-2026-45591, an ASP.NET Core denial of service (CVSS 7.5); and CVE-2026-45491, a .NET tampering issue (CVSS 6.2).

Add these Microsoft updates to your standard developer update release plan.

Adobe (and third-party updates)

Adobe released APSB26-63 for Acrobat and Reader this cycle, fixing critical code-execution flaws; Adobe reports no exploitation in the wild. Add it to your standard third-party schedule. This is a big (fat) Windows update this month (and yes, I think that AI has something to do with the number of these patches). 

Good luck with your deployments.