‘When you can bring AI sort of natively into some of these experiences, you’ll make it easier, you’ll make it more intuitive for people,’ says Microsoft Consumer Chief Marketing Officer and Executive Vice President Yusuf Mehdi.
Days after Microsoft ended support for Windows 10, the vendor is updating its Windows 11 operating system with new capabilities to bring artificial intelligence capabilities beyond Copilot+ PCs, including a way to activate Copilot through voice, analyze content on screen and in files, and move text from one file into a different kind of file.
The Redmond, Wash.-based tech giant said that capabilities coming soon to Windows Insider members include talking to Copilot Vision with text, Ask Copilot in the taskbar and leveraging the agentic Copilot Actions for interacting with local files.
“We’re on the cusp of the next evolution, which is where AI happens not just in that chatbot but gets naturally integrated into the hundreds of millions of experiences that people use every day,” Microsoft Consumer Chief Marketing Officer and Executive Vice President Yusuf Mehdi said in a press briefing. “When you can bring AI sort of natively into some of these experiences, you’ll make it easier, you’ll make it more intuitive for people.”
[RELATED: MSP Execs Expect Windows 11 Migrations To Continue Long After Tuesday Support End Date]
Microsoft Windows AI Upgrades
Mark Linton, Microsoft’s vice president for device partner sales, told CRN in an email that partners have been “critical in working with customers for all aspects of migration planning.”
“We’ve seen strong engagement from across the ecosystem in helping customers plan and execute migrations or manage” extended security updates for giving Win10 users some security after support ended Tuesday, he said.
The vendor has about 500,000 partners worldwide. Top channel goals for 2025 include increasing the overall percentage of company revenue that comes through the channel and improving partner profitability, according to CRN’s 2025 Channel Chiefs.
Mike Wilson, partner and CTO at Mason, Ohio-based Microsoft solution provider Interlink Cloud Advisors—No. 451 on CRN’s 2025 Solution Provider 500—told CRN in a recent interview that AI agents have proven a big opportunity for his company.
Interlink has been leveraging Microsoft’s Copilot Studio to build agents and using Azure AI Foundry to transform traditional business process automation, he said.
“Everybody knows, ‘I’ve got to do something with AI for my business,’” Wilson said. “But figuring out what that is is the $1 million challenge for everybody—both on the reseller side and on the businesses taking advantage of it.”
Windows Security Commitments
Microsoft pledges that, as part of its security commitments with Copilot Actions, the tool is off by default with users having the ability to pause, take control and disable Actions whenever they want. Copilot Actions has a setting for mandating approval requests for specific actions involving sensitive and important decisions. And the vendor said it is seeking any additional security and privacy controls feedback on Actions.
With people typing up to 14,000 words a day on their keyboards, voice interaction with PCs is a new modality for users, he said. “It doesn’t replace the keyboard and mouse necessarily, but it’s an additive thing,” he said. “This will be pretty profound.”
About 1.6 billion PCs run Windows, Mehdi said during the press briefing. The updates are “going to be the key thing to bridge between some of the AI hype we’ve got and the reality of what people are facing so they can more easily discover and create and achieve what they want on Windows with Copilot at their side.”
None of the new updates replace the Recall feature Microsoft has been working on to improve search on AI PCs, the CMO said. “We’re bringing a lot of these powerful Copilot capabilities to everybody on Windows 11,” he said. “People are really loving the capabilities. Can we bring it to more PCs more quickly and enable more innovation?”
New Windows 11 Capabilities
The ability to activate Copilot Voice through saying, “Hey Copilot” to the Win11 PC is now generally available, according to Microsoft. Users can enable the “wake word” in the settings of the Copilot application. Saying the phrase prompts a Copilot microphone on screen with a chime to signal Copilot is listening.
Users can end the conversation by saying “goodbye” or tapping “X.” Copilot ends the conversation automatically after a few seconds without interaction, with a chime signaling the conversation ended.
Now available in the same markets as Copilot is Copilot Vision, which allows the AI tool to analyze content and answer questions based on desktop and applications shared with the tool. Users can vocally ask Copilot “show me how” to get directions on a task within an app. Use cases include telling users how to improve photos or reviewing travel itineraries with advice on how to improve plans, according to Microsoft.
Users can share Word, Excel and PowerPoint files with Copilot Vision, which can read files beyond what is displayed on screen.
The text-based way to communicate with Copilot for users who don’t want people nearby to hear what they are working on is coming “soon” to Windows Insider members, according to Microsoft. Until then, Vision users only have the option to interact with the tool through their voices, with Copilot speaking aloud. Once text-based communication is enabled, Copilot will respond with text in the same chat window.
Mehdi acknowledged that learning to type longer queries to give AI tools all the context they need compared with the 2.3 keywords per query traditional search engine users type on average has been a “big challenge,” something Vision might have the ability to ease.
Allowing voice-enabled AI should appeal to the “hundreds of millions of people today [who] talk for billions of minutes in offices with headphones,” Mehdi said. “Just like when the mouse came out, people have to figure out when to use it, what’s the right way, how to make it happen.”
Users also now have the ability to ask Copilot to export text from one file into a Word, Excel or PowerPoint project, according to the vendor. A new Copilot on Windows integration with Windows Settings allows users to receive guidance on changing device settings.
Win11 Abilities In Preview, Limited Access
The taskbar Ask Copilot experience becoming an option for Windows Insiders offers one-click access to Copilot Vision and Voice.
A preview for Copilot Actions comes “soon” for Windows Insiders in Copilot Labs looking to allow the tool to sort through local files and extract information from them. Copilot Actions is a general-purpose AI agent that tries to complete tasks described in the user’s own words, according to Microsoft. It can interact with desktop and web apps, freeing the user to do other tasks while the agent acts.
Users have the ability to take over the task the agent is handling whenever they want. They can also check the agent’s progress and review actions taken to complete the task, according to the vendor.
Microsoft will only allow a narrow set of use cases in the beginning and optimize model performance based on learnings. The company warned that the agent may make mistakes and hit challenges with more complex interfaces.
A private preview is available for Windows 11 users who want to use the Manus general AI agent as a native Windows app to make websites with documents in a local folder with one click, no uploading and no coding. Users can leverage Manus from a chat window without leaving the session.
Microsoft is also adding the ability to edit videos in File Explorer with Filmora. For Windows Insider members with Copilot+ PCs, a Zoom integration with Click to Do will allow Zoom meeting scheduling through hovering over an email address on screen without switching applications or copying details, according to Microsoft.
Microsoft Entra and Microsoft account identity support are part of the defense measures coming soon for Copilot Actions, according to the vendor.
Agent Security Principles
Microsoft has also published a series of security and privacy principles meant to help users who leverage AI agents.
The vendor also warned agent users about cross-prompt injection when using agents that can result in malicious content embedded in user interface elements or documents overriding agent instructions and leading to data exfiltration or malware installation.
Part of those principles is the ability for agents in Windows to operate with dedicated accounts distinct from the user account on the device, giving agents policies that can be different from the rules applied to human user accounts. Human users have the ability to share access to files and other resources to dedicated agent accounts like they do with other device users, according to Microsoft.
Agents start with limited permissions and only obtain access to resources given permission by users. Agents can’t make changes to devices without human intervention, and users can revoke permissions and access any time.
Trusted sources must sign for agents integrated with Windows to allow for certificate validation, antivirus and other defense measures to revoke and block malicious agents, according to Microsoft.
Copilot Actions security controls include the agent being disabled by default and an agent workspace contained environment where agents work in parallel with humans with runtime isolation and granular permissions. The agent has its own desktop with limited visibility and access to the user’s desktop activity, according to the vendor. Agent accounts also help with distinguishing work by the agent and work by a human PC user.
Copilot Actions’ experimental preview access will only allow agents to interact with Documents, Downloads, Desktop, Pictures and other local known folders and resources accessible to all accounts on the system, according to Microsoft. Users have to authorize Copilot Actions to access data outside those folders.
All the news around agents in Windows follows recent advancements revealed by Microsoft for parts of its productivity portfolio. In recent days, Microsoft has launched the Microsoft 365 Premium subscription for individuals, made Agent Mode in Copilot for Excel available for Frontier program members and made Copilot Chat available in M365 apps for individual subscribers and added Anthropic models to M365 Copilot.
