Microsoft updates Notepad with more formatting tools, Paint gets more AI

Microsoft has no new Windows 11 preview builds this Wednesday, but the company still released fresh updates for Windows Insiders to test. This time, the company is rolling out new features for Notepad and Paint, some of the most popular Windows 11 inbox apps. Starting with Notepad, version 11.2512.10.0 brings new Markdown formatting tools, namely strikethrough and nested lists.

Also, the app now has a new welcoming experience that teaches users about Notepad's latest features. You can bring it up any time by pressing the megaphone icon in the top-right corner of the toolbar. Finally, Microsoft improved text streaming when using AI to generate text. When you write, rewrite, or summarize text in Notepad with local or cloud-based AI, results appear much faster and without the need for you to wait for the complete response.

Moving to Paint, we have version 11.2512.191.0. The main change in the update is the new Coloring Book feature. This AI-powered feature can generate coloring book pages using text prompts. You can type what you want to generate, and Paint will then create a set of pages for you to choose. The selected variant can be added to your canvas, copied, or saved for later use.

Note that Coloring Book in Paint is only available on Copilot+ PCs. Additionally, like AI-based features in Notepad, using the Coloring Book feature requires signing in with a Microsoft Account.

Besides AI, Paint is getting a new fill tolerance slider that controls how precisely the Fill tool applies color. This lets you have clean fills or more creative results.

The new features for Notepad and Paint are now rolling out to Windows Insiders in the Canary and Dev Channels on Windows 11. You can read more about the updates in a post on the official Windows Blogs website.

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Posted Thursday 22 January 2026 at 12:49 pm AEST (my time).

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