Windows 11 has a new preview of the beta channel It offers new clicks to make features for copilot+ pcs, including reading coach -integration Search has also been pepped up with AI, and voice access has also received a practical new addition
Windows 11’s latest preview version arrived just arrived packing improved search functionality and some impressive new opportunities for accessibility, including the integration of Microsoft’s ‘Reading Coach’ app on certain PCs.
This is Preview Build 26120.3872 in the beta channel, and some of the fresh additions are only for copilot+ PCs, and specifically only for devices with snapdragon (arm-based) chips.
So first in this category is the integration of reading coach with click to Do. To summarize these pieces of functionality, click to do, provides context-sensitive actions that are AI-driven-this was brought in as a partner feature to remember the Copilot+ PCS and Reading Coach became available for free at the beginning of 2024.
The latter is an app you can download from the Microsoft store to practice your literacy and pronunciation, and reading coach can now be selected directly from clicks to make context menu so you can work on any selected text. (Of course, you need the coaching app that is installed to do this, of course).
Also new to click to do (and copilot+ PCs) is a ‘read with immersive reader’ ability, which is a focused reading state designed for those with dyslexia and dysgrafia.
This allows users to adjust text size and distance, font and background theme to best suit their needs, as well as to have a picture dictionary option that Microsoft notes “gives visual representations of unknown words to immediate understanding.” You can also choose to have text to read aloud and be divided into syllables if necessary.
Another nice feature for Copilot+ PCS – albeit only in the European economic area to begin with – is the ability to find photos stored in the cloud (OneDrive) via the Windows 11 search box. Again, this is AI driven so you can use natural language search to find images in OneDrive (such as photos of “Halloween Costumes” for example). Both locals (on the device) and cloud -based photos are shown in the task line seeker results.
All of the above is now being rolled out in tests for Snapdragon-driven Copilot+ PCs, but devices with AMD and Intel CPUs will also be covered in the end.
A further remarkable introduction here – for all PCs this time – is that voice access now gives you the power to add your own words to its dictionary. So if there is a word that the system has difficulty picking up when you say it, you can add a custom dictionary post, and hopefully the next time you use it under dictation, voice access will correctly recognize the word.
There are a lot of other adjustments and improvements in this new preview version, all covered by Microsoft’s blog post on the new Beta Build.
(Image Credit: Microsoft)
Analysis: Sterling Progress
It is good to see Microsoft’s continued efforts to improve Windows 11 in terms of accessibility and learning, although some of the core introductions here will not be brought through to most people – as they do not have a copilot+ PC. What is also clear is that Microsoft clearly gives units with Snapdragon processors prioritized continuously, and that’s fine as long as the same forces come to all Copilot+ PCs eventually (as they do so far and there’s no reason why they shouldn’t).
Grants for voice access are very convenient, although I am surprised that it took Microsoft as long as to implement it. I was previously a heavy user of nuance (Dragon) Speech Recognition Tool (my RSI has been healed a long time, partly thanks to a break from writing using this software) and it offered this functionality. Since Windows 11’s voice access is essentially built on the same technique – bought Microsoft Nuance back in 2021 – it has taken a while to integrate what I felt was an important feature.
As always, it’s better late than never, and I certainly can’t complain that voice access is free, or at least free in terms of being gathered with Windows 11.
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