Microsoft confirms it’s bringing “new experiences” to Windows 11 next month

In a blog post published earlier today, Microsoft has confirmed that it’s bringing “new experiences” to Windows 11 next month. According to the blog post, Windows 11 users will finally be able to run Android apps from next month. The company will also bring taskbar improvements, redesigned apps, which include Notepad and Media Player. Although not officially confirmed, all these new changes are likely to be part of the first big update of Windows 11.

Preview of Android apps is already available for Dev and Beta Channel Insiders, but from next month, it’ll be broadly available. Microsoft partnered with Amazon and Intel to make sure that the maximum number of Android apps become available to both AMD and Intel-based Windows 11 PCs.

However, it’s worth noting that not all Android apps are officially supported on Windows 11. According to Microsoft, apps that are available on the Amazon web store will be available for users. While users can sideload the Google Play Store and install any Android apps that they want, Microsoft officially made no announcements regarding this.

Besides Android apps support, next month will also see an improved taskbar, which will include call mute and unmute, easier window sharing, weather widget. All these changes are already available for Insiders, but as is the case with Android apps support, they’ll be available for the general public from next month.

The new Media Player is another exciting feature that will finally be available for every Windows 11 user from next month. The new Media Player app will replace the current Groove Music app on your Windows 11 PC. Your music collection in the Groove Music app will automatically be migrated to the new app. The new Media Player app has all the features that you can find on the Groove Music app, but the former shares the same design as Windows 11. You’ll also be able to browse, manage, and watch your local video collections.

The new Notepad that Microsoft rolled out to Insiders earlier this month will also be available for the general public. The new Notepad can now adapt to your system theme preferences. In other words, it now supports dark mode as well as light mode. It’ll respect your system theme preference.

The blog post also gives some valuable insights into the number of people currently using Windows 11/10. According to Microsoft, Windows 10 and Windows 11 now powers over 1.4 billion monthly active devices. The blog post also discusses how the pandemic forced people to spend more time on their PCs. Additionally, Microsoft has said that Windows has seen a 6x increase in people using collaboration tools like Cisco WebEx, Slack, Microsoft Teams and Zoom.