Microsoft released two new builds for Windows Insiders in the Release Preview channel. The new builds bring numerous new features and improvements.
Microsoft has released new Release Preview channel builds for Windows 11 Insiders on 24H2 and 25H2. Builds 26100.8942 and 26200.8942 bring a solid batch of new features, including Voice Isolation for Voice Access, new touchpad gesture controls, improved File Explorer and search behavior, and expanded Windows Hello Enhanced Sign-in Security support.
The full changelog is below:
Gradual rolloutThis section covers new features and enhancements delivered gradually to Windows 11 PCs. Availability might vary by device.
• File Explorer
• File sizes in Details view now display appropriate units (KB, MB, and GB) instead of KB-only, making them easier to understand at a glance.
• Middle-click to open a folder in a new tab is now supported in the address bar and Home page for a more consistent and efficient tabbed navigation experience across File Explorer.
• This update eliminates a gray flash on load and unexpected scrolling to the top on the Home page in certain cases.
• This update improves the appearance of file thumbnails in the Recommended section on Home so they're crisper and easier to read.
• Windows Search
• This update improves file finding across local, cloud, and connected content, including support for two-character file searches.
• This update improves app search to better handle typos and partial app names when finding installed apps.
• This update improves Settings relevance to surface more useful settings higher in search results.
• Voice Access New!
• This update adds Voice Isolation to Voice Access, helping it better recognize your voice by reducing interference from other speakers and background noise.
• Voice Access now offers three speech recognition modes under
Voice Access settings >
Improve speech recognition:
• Voice Isolation: Filters out other speakers and background noise (one-time voice setup required).
• Remove background noise only: Filters out non-speech sounds like typing or door slams (no additional setup required).
• No filtering: Uses default microphone input with no additional processing.
To set up Voice Isolation, go to
Voice Access settings >
Improve speech recognition and select V
oice Isolation.
• New! This update adds Korean language support for Voice Access.
• Widgets New!
• Taskbar notification badges now use your Windows accent color instead of appearing red, helping reduce unnecessary attention-grabbing alerts.
• This update also simplifies the Lock screen Widgets experience. For new users, Weather is now the only widget shown on the Lock screen by default.
• Touchpad New! New gesture controls for precision touchpads are available in
Settings >
Bluetooth & devices >
Touchpad:
• Scroll and zoom speed: Adjust the baseline speed for scroll and zoom gestures.
• Accelerated scrolling: Scroll faster the more you repeat the gesture, so you can move quickly through long documents.
• Start menu
• This update improves reliability of Start menu view preferences, ensuring your selected view is retained.
• This update improves keyboard navigation when keyboard focus is set to the apps list within Start menu.
• Voice typing Fluid dictation is now off by default for new users. A teaching tip is available when the feature is used for the first time.
• Input Improved persistence of mouse cursor size.
• Accessibility This update improves the Magnifier experience on touch-enabled devices. The horizontal and vertical touch bars used to pan the magnified view are now off by default, so they no longer obstruct magnified content. If you use touch to pan, you can turn the bars back on in
Settings >
Accessibility >
Magnifier.
• Windows Hello New! Windows Hello Enhanced Sign-in Security (ESS) now supports peripheral fingerprint sensors. This extends this secure sign-in option beyond devices with built-in fingerprint sensors to include desktops and other Windows 11 PCs, including Copilot+ PCs. To get started, plug in a supported ESS fingerprint reader, go to
Settings >
Accounts >
Sign in options, and follow the prompts to enroll. This feature was previously disclosed in January 2026 (KB5074105) and is now beginning to roll out.
• Fonts
• This update restores support for Unicode variation sequences in the Myanmar Text font.
• This update improves character shaping and rendering for Mongolian Baiti font, providing more accurate and consistent text display.
• Account Control This update refreshes the design of the Start menu account control and adds a badge that displays your subscription status. To view account control, open Start menu and select your account picture in the lower-left corner. This experience is available for users signed in with a Microsoft account.
• Taskbar This update improves reliability of loading the system tray area of the taskbar when using the taskbar on touch devices in a tablet posture.
• AI Component This update allows you to remove the Image Generation AI component from supported Copilot+ PCs where the component is installed.
• Windows Setup This update adds a parental controls notice during Windows setup that highlights available family safety features.
• Power and battery
• Changes to global power settings such as display, sleep, hibernate timeouts, power/sleep button actions, and lid-close actions from Settings are now applied to all power plans.
• This update improves reliability of power settings by applying changes made in Settings to all power plans so your preferences are consistently maintained.
• Windows Update
• This update improves calculation of update progress in Windows Update Settings.
• This update includes changes to update clean-up logic to improve system performance immediately following an update.
• Sounds This update improves system sounds when using Windows in dark mode.
• Date and time
• This update improves detection for triggering time zone change notifications.
• This update improves daylight saving time (DST) data accuracy for Middle East Standard Time (Beirut), Morocco Standard Time (Casablanca), Israel Standard Time (Jerusalem), and Greenland Standard Time (Nuuk).
• Network This update improves reliability of DHCP renewals in a few scenarios, particularly when NACKs are received from the DHCP server and on devices that use Modern Standby.
• Print This update improves print time performance (pages per minute) for IPPS (Internet Printing Protocol Secure) printers.
• Clipboard This update improves clipboard reliability in some Remote Desktop and Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD) scenarios.
• Battery This update restores the ability to set a threshold for when Energy saver should enable within
Settings >
System >
Power & battery.
• General reliability
• This update improves explorer.exe reliability, including when opening jump lists and recent files, when sharing files and folders, and when using Task View and multiple desktops.
• This update improves reliability of the Windows sign-in and lock screens, especially when system memory is low.
• This update improves reliability of Start menu and taskbar during startup.
Normal rolloutThis non-security update includes quality improvements. The following summary outlines key issues addressed by the KB update after you install it. The bold text within the brackets indicates the item or area of the change.
• Additional quality improvements are included with this update.
Feature availability varies by device and market.
You can find the blog post for builds Builds 26100.8942/26200.8942
here.
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