• Microsoft is improving Windows 11 search in multiple ways
• That includes a calmer search panel, the ability to turn off web results, a better way of prioritizing returned results, and a more stable search overall
• This is in testing for now, and the main worry is how long it might take for Microsoft to usher all this through to release

If you're fed up with the way Windows 11's search functionality works – and you wouldn't be alone – some incoming changes are set to greatly improve this experience.

Microsoft revealed the tweaks to the search box in a blog post, explaining that they're being delivered via a gradual rollout to testers in the Experimental channel for Windows 11 preview builds.

The first major change is simply to make search a calmer place, so when the panel appears, it only contains a list of your recent searches (allowing you to easily fire up one of those again if you wish). The current clutter to the right of that list, including recommendations – some of which are outright adverts – along with trending searches has all been banished.

And the second important piece of work here is that Microsoft is finally giving Windows 11 users the ability to get rid of web results in search. Currently, when searching for a file in the operating system you get not just local results (for files on your drives), but also some web results which can get in the way.

In this new scheme of things, you'll be able to switch off all web results in Settings, and also ditch Microsoft Store suggestions too.

If you keep these results on, Microsoft notes that they won't be prioritized, although this is something the company had already started to address (it used to be the case that web content could appear at the top of the returned results in a truly baffling fashion). Web results have also been stripped of any 'promotional content' so you'll only get the most relevant answers if these results are enabled.

Microsoft has also bolstered the handling of results for Windows 11 settings so that more relevant options are flagged up higher in the pecking order, and Microsoft says further fine-tuning is planned on this front.

The search box will also be able to handle typos, with an improved ability to guess what you really meant ('Chrome' rather than 'Chome' for example), and it'll start to surface possible results after typing just two characters (another enhancement we've already heard about).

While this is mostly all about streamlining, Microsoft is going the other way in one notable respect — adding a bit more detail in for the files returned in the results. Search will now provide more info about files (such as when they were last opened) and a more in-depth preview in the right-hand panel, so you can more readily tell what you'll be opening if you click on that result.

Finally, Microsoft is making search more reliable, which involves "reducing [the] likelihood of crashing and loading issues" which is obviously a welcome move.

Analysis: the rollout fly in the soothing search ointment

Windows 11 search has always been a somewhat painful affair for me, thanks mainly to the clutter of the thinly veiled (or not even veiled at all) ads, and the irrelevant results which were surfaced with a baffling level of priority, as noted. Windows 10 isn't a lot better, frankly, but at any rate, I'm very happy to see the fresh direction Microsoft has taken here.

The calmer search results are a major boon, with Microsoft following in the same vein as the streamlining it recently announced for the widgets panel, which was made a quieter place. (All this follows a broader early promise to rein in the upselling with Windows 11 and generally make the interface a more chilled place).

I was hoping that the option to turn off web results would be brought in, and this is the most important addition for me personally. I'm not alone, and the reaction to these various changes has been very positive, with the only real sticking point being impatience around when these new features will be rolled out. That's both in terms of testers wanting to try the revamped search box now, and the general computing public wondering when they will eventually get their hands on all this.

As this tester posts on Reddit: "We love this... except gradual rollouts. We don't like when things are inconsistent from PC to PC despite running identical [test] builds [of Windows 11]. It's really obnoxious and breaks muscle memory. But the changes seem great and I look forward to trying them."

As Microsoft points out in its blog post, it's worth remembering that there are now feature flags that can be enabled if you're really keen to try out something in a preview build, and it's not on your PC yet.

However, as for those asking: 'For those of us on release, when might this arrive?'

Well, that's a very different kettle of fish, as it could take quite some time for this work to progress through testing. Mainly because there are a lot of changes involved, and it's not something Microsoft will want to rush (especially given the drive to make search more reliable and stable).

And when these search improvements are eventually released outside of testing, it'll be on a controlled rollout that you won't be able to jump the queue with. However, there's a reason for that – Microsoft will need to observe the changes going live in a gradual manner to ensure no unexpected gremlins are crawling around in the works.

So, you will have to be patient, and there's some frustration around the length of time it can take for controlled rollouts to proceed these days (the Start menu overhaul from last year being a key example here – some folks still don't have it even now). But the good news is that these changes are coming, and they promise to revamp search in Windows 11 to a considerable extent. I can't wait (but I'll have to).

London Tech Week’s focus on AI - from a £12 million investment in AI for SMEs to AI bootcamps for graduates and more - has reflected the pressure to compete in an AI-era.

As this digital revolution progresses, the job economy is changing, but the mantra that AI is taking our jobs is simply not correct and potentially fueled by an undercurrent of classicism.

When the Luddites famously started to break the first machines of the industrial revolution in 1811 in England, fearing for their job as textile artisans, the “Bourgeoisie” would describe them as “ignorant workers”, with no understanding of basic economics.

More than two hundred years later, with the rise of GenAI, it is no longer the blue-collar workers who fear for their job, but the white-collar workers. This time it is the “bourgeois” who live in the anxiety of an uncertain world.

Since ChatGPT introduced AI into the everyday lexicon, it has been clear that we would experience an unprecedented revolution. The rhetoric that immediately began to dominate social discourse has been that AI tools would render most jobs insignificant.

Furthermore, whilst other technological revolutions ended up being creative destruction, ‘this time it was different’.

But is that really the case? Or are we more fearful, more concerned about destroying the status quo, because this time it’s a different ‘class’ of people being impacted? This time it’s the desk workers, not the physical laborers, who risk losing jobs, and suddenly there is alarm.

Artificial Intelligence relies on humans - and more humans than ever

AI is a human creation and still relies on humans to evolve. First, we have those who build the infrastructure, like data centers, which accounted for almost all of the United States’ GDP growth in the first half of 2025 (according to Harvard economist Jason Furman).

Then, we have those who train the models, which still need to be constantly retrained. Even if models are able to train themselves eventually, there is no consensus that human intervention in training will become obsolete, because human behavior and the entropy of organizations are in a constant state of flux and evolution.

And even when trained, AI constantly needs to also understand the “context” in which it is prompted to perform efficiently. AI then needs to be deployed. Managing security, defining guardrails for agents, understanding how to use AI and tracking agentic AI’s actions, all comes with inherent challenges.

The CIOs of the largest global corporations are already investing hundreds of millions of pounds to understand this. Startups based in San Francisco - a city I recently visited where 95% of out-of-home ads were about AI agents - are focused entirely on resolving these problems for large enterprises.

The fact that both Anthropic and OpenAI have launched their own consulting companies is proof that managing AI complexities in the coming years will be the biggest source of growth for all consulting and outsourcing companies of the world.

Sourcing the right human talent in the AI era is the biggest challenge

Software engineering is a job category where GenAI - perfectly trained on open-source code and GitHub repositories - can now code better than even the most experienced developers.

Additionally, developers in AI labs - with privileged access to “tokens” on Claude Code or OpenAI Codex - now develop 100% of the time without writing a single line of code. Nonetheless, when asked about their biggest challenges, all AI startups would point to recruitment.

A report by the UK's National Foundation for Education Research showed a 50% increase in tech job adverts between 2019/20 and 2024/25, with entry-level roles particularly affected. However, we’re now seeing a surge in demand driven by Gen Z, according to Employment Hero’s March Jobs Report.

This demand for AI expertise is reflected in a new Malt Tech Trends Report, which analyzed 1.2 million searches of tech freelancers in 2025. It reveals that AI is now the second most-in-demand skill, irrespective of company size, industry, or project type. More specifically, demand for freelancers with agentic AI expertise exploded by 5,800% in just twelve months.

Observer of the AI revolution, Andrew Ng, explains that if, for example, a team of 3 developers builds 10 times faster, then they need more designers or product managers to fuel the creative process. Doing more faster, with fewer people creates more work to fuel and execute the output.

More people are echoing the same rhetoric as Ng, calling out the phenomenon of ‘AI washing’, whereby companies have justified mass redundancies with AI disruption. In reality, in many cases, they were either adapting to geopolitical and economic uncertainties or had simply employed too many in the crazy post-COVID bull market.

The AI job apocalypse is not yet here… Still, the fear is real and needs to be understood

Software engineering is a perfect example of a job category that has constantly evolved. Since the inception of computer science, programming has become progressively more about “natural language”. Whilst there were 50,000 developers worldwide in the 1960s, today there are almost 50 million. Undoubtedly, the eradication of barriers to entry to build software increases that number tenfold.

History, data, and observation shows us that the AI job apocalypse is not yet here. Still, the fear is real and needs to be understood. The reason every science fiction novel paints an inhospitable world and unattractive paradigm is because the human mind always fears change. We assume the worst.

AI transformation, like all transformations, will be a cultural change first. And it’s companies, not professionals, who are most at risk if they fail to adapt. If one thing will be different in this digital revolution, compared to the last (arguably comparable is the advent of the internet), it’s the rate of change.

CEOs will have to be imaginative, change org charts and processes, admit they are not omniscient, take risks, and invest in training. Schools and universities also face the challenge of teaching soft skills: how to adapt to live and work in a more uncertain world. Because we can only harness top-tier AI talent if we understand how to truly adapt to change.

Independent professionals - those who create their own roles - from freelance developer to fractional manager and strategic consultants - have already redefined work.

On average, freelancers spend 4 hours a week on upskilling and keeping up with the job market and already have the habit of switching from one client project to another. They were the first to adapt to AI and realize that a job is more than just a bundle of tasks.

As Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia, recently said, if someone were to observe him at work, we would conclude that his day consists of tasks like making hundreds of calls and sending emails. AI will replace, augment, and improve these tasks. But it will not take Jensen’s job.

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• Microsoft has blocked Secure Boot updates on some devices
• There have been issues with some devices updating from the 2011 certificate to the latest 2023 certificate
• Some older devices or those not supported by their OEM may be restricted in downloading the latest Secure Boot certificates

Microsoft has blocked some Windows 11 PCs from installing Secure Boot updates due to known issues with certificate updates.

The company is currently rolling out an update for Secure Boot on devices using certificates issued in 2011, which are now expired. The new 2023 certificate is being applied through Windows Update, but issues on devices with faulty firmware have forced Microsoft to halt the rollout.

“Devices in this group are affected by a known issue. To reduce risk, Secure Boot certificate updates are temporarily paused while Microsoft and partners work toward a supported resolution,” Microsoft said.

Secure Boot issues

Secure Boot has long been a device-saving feature when it comes to removing malicious files, as it allows the device to verify and load only authentic software before booting to Windows. However if the device cannot receive certificate updates it can fall victim to threats at the boot-level before Windows is loaded.

Microsoft is currently working with manufacturers to issue a patch that will allow affected devices to install the new Secure Boot 2023 certificate, with HP issuing a BIOS update to allow the installation of the latest certificate.

What this means in practice is that some older devices, or devices that no longer receive updates via their Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM), will not be able to apply Secure Boot and Boot Manager protections. Microsoft clarified that, “this results in a gradual reduction in long-term security—not an immediate risk or system failure. Continue to follow standard security practices, including staying current with Windows updates.”

So even if your device is blocked from installing the latest Secure Boot certificate, it will continue to work properly, other Windows updates will continue to work, and your Secure Boot version will continue to protect against known vulnerabilities. It’s just future vulnerabilities that users affected by this issue will need to be aware of.

Many users may not be aware of issues until they need to use Secure Boot, so the silver lining in Microsoft’s warning is that now is the perfect time to check if your Secure Boot is working properly.

How to check Secure Boot is up to date

To check if you are using the latest Secure Boot certificate, take the following steps:

• Open the Windows Security app using the search bar
• Navigate to the Device Security dashboard using the menu on the right hand side
• Look at the Secure Boot section, and check for the following messages:

1. "Secure Boot is on"

If you see this message, Secure Boot is likely working properly. However, this does not display your certificates’ current state. Microsoft has been rolling out an update to show if your Secure Boot is running on the latest certificate, so make sure your don't have any pending Windows updates.

2. “Devices in this group are affected by a known issue.”

Devices with this message will likely be able to install the latest certificates once a firmware update has been issued by your OEM. Check your OEM update channel for availability.

3. “Secure Boot is on, but your device does not support the automated Secure Boot certificate update due to hardware or firmware limitations.”

Devices with this message may no longer be supported by your OEM, or the OEM might no longer be able to provide the firmware updates needed. Microsoft recommends checking your OEM’s Secure Boot support page to confirm whether your device is out of support.

Via WindowsLatest

• Windows 11's Copilot app has a new feature in testing
• 'PC insights' provides an easy way to receive clear answers to hardware-based questions about your device and its specs
• While there are some fears over privacy (and bloat), Microsoft has made it clear that Copilot needs to be granted permission to access your system and files

Copilot is getting a new ability to answer questions about your PC's hardware, allowing the AI to tap into the relevant hardware details to do so – and while Microsoft is treading carefully with privacy here, that's unlikely to stop some level of paranoia.

Windows Latest flagged the introduction of 'PC insights' for the Copilot app on Windows 11, which as Microsoft explains, "enables customers to conversationally ask Copilot questions about their Windows PC and receive clear responses based on their device's state without having to dig through system settings."

This is currently an experimental feature, so still in testing, and an optional ability that you must turn on for it to be in play. Windows Latest notes that it's gradually rolling out, but only in the US for now.

You can ask Copilot how much RAM you have, or storage space left, or what your GPU is, and the current level of usage for your processor, and a whole bunch of similar component-related queries. You can ask about elements as diverse as whether you have an antivirus running, or what your laptop's battery health is, diving into mild troubleshooting territory should you wish.

To get its answers, the Copilot app hooks up to Windows APIs to analyze your system, and the AI asks for permission to do this. You can allow it access to your PC's hardware details on a one-time basis for that session only, or you can elect to 'always allow' if you're happy to give Copilot this access on a more permanent basis.

Analysis: fears over hallucinations and bloat

As ever, this is AI, and as Microsoft notes, Copilot "may not always provide complete or accurate information", especially during this testing phase. So, if you do get a chance to try out PC insights, maintain a healthy sense of skepticism with the responses you get.

As Windows Latest makes clear, there's also a certain irony about a Windows 11 user checking up on resource usage, perhaps due to system sluggishness, employing the Copilot AI to run diagnostics when the app itself uses the best part of 1GB of RAM when running in the background and doing nothing.

That doesn't stop this new PC insights feature from being situationally useful, of course. Some of the reaction has come from a place of disdain, though, as you might guess, with comments such as the one from this Redditor: "Oh hey it's like Task Manager except instead of lightweight and authoritative, it's bloated and might be lying to me."

Of course, this is a feature aimed at less well-informed PC owners, not those who can easily understand what's happening in Task Manager at a glance. Criticism around the bloat of the Copilot app is fair enough, mind, and this is because in its most recent incarnation, Microsoft changed things so the app is essentially a standalone spin-off of the Edge browser.

Another worry is that of privacy, and having Copilot 'snoop around' on your machine, but as noted, there are clear requests for permissions, and the new feature is strictly opt-in. You don't ever have to go near PC insights if you don't want to. It's also worth noting that giving the Copilot app access permissions doesn't mean it can read the actual contents of files, but only their sizes (for weighing up questions about storage and the like).

At the moment, this is a purely informative or troubleshooting feature, and in the case of attempted diagnostics, it may point to issues with your PC, but won't resolve them for you. However, it's not difficult to envision where Microsoft might head with this, in terms of getting Copilot to implement fixes for certain issues that the AI flags up. I'm talking simple Settings changes rather than anything in-depth, and this has always been the idea of Copilot (even though it hasn't yet been realized to much of an extent).

When we get AI agents in Windows 11 – and they are coming, make no mistake – this kind of functionality may turn into a full-on troubleshooting agent. The trouble (pun not intended) with that being that the mistakes and hallucinations that AI can make could be considerably more aggravating in this kind of scenario.

There used to be a time when you’d buy an Apple app by paying for it once and never again. Then along came the idea of app subscriptions, and slowly but surely, Apple has started selling more and more of its software products through recurring payments. From iCloud+ to Apple TV, there are many ways to spend your cash on Apple’s wares on an ongoing basis.

Today, Apple flogs bundles of its own apps to its users, with Apple One in particular offering a cluster of apps for a single monthly price. And Apple hasn’t stopped there, with the Creator Studio package being introduced a few months ago for users of its artistic apps.

But while these app groupings ostensibly give you a way to get the software you need without paying multiple subscription fees, I’m starting to worry about how they restrict your choices and force you down avenues you might not want to travel.

Not only can they be expensive, but they’re also inflexible, giving you very little ability to customize them to your needs. If subscriptions are the future of app monetization, then Apple needs to do a whole lot better.

Enter the Creator Studio

Apple likes to portray itself as the company of creatives — think about its “Here’s to the crazy ones” or “I’m a Mac” commercials of days gone by. And the firm already sells apps made specifically for this demographic, including Logic Pro, Final Cut Pro, Pixelmator Pro, and more. So it makes sense that Apple would want to offer a software suite that grants interested users access for a single fee, instead of requiring several payments, whether one-off or ongoing.

That’s what you get with the Creator Studio, which is priced at $12.99 / £12.99 / AU$19.99 a month or $129 / £129 / AU$199 a year. In return for your cash, you get a pass for the following apps:

• Final Cut Pro
• Logic Pro
• Pixelmator Pro
• Keynote
• Pages
• Numbers
• Motion
• Compressor
• MainStage

And yes, some of these apps — like Keynote, Pages, and Numbers — are already free, but pay the Creator Studio entry fee and you get “a library of high-quality, royalty-free photos and graphics, and powerful intelligence features” in addition to what comes with the toll-free editions, Apple says.

Considering Logic Pro alone costs $199.99 if you want to buy it outright (rather than pay an ongoing subscription), this package might seem like a rather good deal. But it’s not the price that I’m interested in — it’s the way app bundles like Creator Studio work.

Right now, there are two main app collections available from Apple: Creator Studio and Apple One. While Creator Studio contains the aforementioned creative apps, Apple One starts at $19.95 / £18.95 / AU$24.95 a month and comes with 50GB of iCloud+ storage, plus memberships to Apple TV, Apple Music, and Apple Arcade.

There are two additional tiers, with the most expensive costing $37.95 / £36.95 / AU$49.95 a month and throwing in 2TB of iCloud+ storage, Apple Fitness+, and Apple News+, in addition to what’s already in the entry-level option.

But what if you want to mix and match your apps and services from Apple? What if you want, say, Logic Pro and Final Cut Pro from Creator Studio, plus Apple Music, Apple Fitness+, and Apple News+? Well, you’re going to have to either take out the top Apple One bundle and separately buy those creative apps outright, or you’ve got to pay for memberships of two distinct ongoing subscriptions.

In this instance, combining Creator Studio with the most expensive edition of Apple One means paying $50.94 a month when all you want are five apps. The rest of the content you pay for is superfluous. Throw in AppleCare+, and you’re forking out even more.

Apple gives practically no flexibility or customization with its app collections. You can’t mix and match apps and services, and if there are some you want from both subscriptions, you’ve got to pay for both. That makes it an incredibly expensive way to go.

But with Apple seemingly getting evermore enthusiastic about subscriptions — and the revenue they bring in — don’t be surprised if this state of affairs continues.

Is there a better way?

You might feel that, since Creator Studio is relatively new, Apple is still working out the logistics of how to sell the apps and services it contains. But Apple is no stranger to subscriptions. It’s been offering the likes of Apple Music and Apple Arcade for years now, so it knows a thing or two about how to structure subscription offerings.

Is the lack of flexibility here and the absence of any way to pick and choose apps a deliberate policy on Apple’s behalf? We can’t know for sure, but it’s not a good look.

While the Creator Studio might seem like a decent bargain on its face, it becomes considerably less so if you’re not interested in everything it offers and want to pair its apps with those from the Apple One bundle.

Considering how keen Apple seems to be on subscriptions, I’m surprised it doesn’t offer individual memberships for each component app within these packages. For instance, why is there no individual subscription for Pixelmator Pro? Instead, you’ve got to choose between a one-off fee or the full Creator Studio.

If Apple were to go down this route — and it's what I'd do if I were CEO-to-be John Ternus — it would instantly solve the problem of pairing different apps from different collections. You could simply add whichever apps you wanted to your own “build a bundle” package and get exactly what you need for a more acceptable price.

But that kind of process doesn’t seem to be anywhere on the horizon. There are no rumors saying it’s coming, no telltale clues nestled in Apple’s code. Don’t hold your breath for its imminent arrival.

Until we do get something like that, Apple customers are going to continue to feel ripped off by a rigid, inflexible system that is happy to take their cash in return for apps they don’t want or need. It’s a situation that’s in desperate need of a rethink.

It wouldn't be a difficult argument to make that the USA is the television capital of the world, or at least the birthplace of modern TV culture.

From Walter Cronkite to Fox & Friends, I Love Lucy to The Simpsons, The Twilight Zone to The Sopranos; whether it's news, current affairs, comedy or drama, US television has produced some of the most iconic, enduring shows committed to the format.

And that's before you even get to sports. What would the sporting calendar look like without Super Bowl Sunday, the Fall Classic, Indy 500 and WrestleMania? Or, most recently, the 2026 World Cup that the USA is co-hosting.

America's shows and sports are collectively the most popular in the world, which means you can continue to watch them on local channels when you're overseas. But it isn't always the case – college basketball, for example, has limited appeal outside the States. And if you go to watch your usual streaming websites, apps and platforms in a different region, they're unlikely to work due to rights restrictions.

Thankfully, there's a very simple way to get around these blackouts. By using one of the best VPNs, you can watch as much US TV as you wish when traveling outside of its borders. Keep reading to discover how.

• Use NordVPN to watch US TV from overseas now (Save 75% with our exclusive deal)

Why can't I watch US TV overseas?

As we say, the international proliferation of US television and sports means that there's a good chance you'll be able to see the content you want in many other parts of the world.

However, due to licensing and rights agreements, you won't necessarily be able to watch them on the platform to which you've become accustomed (and, more commonly than not, pay for).

Try to watch Love Island USA on Peacock, Welcome to Wrexham on Hulu, or a numbered UFC event on Paramount Plus, for example, and you'll be met with an error message telling you that you can't stream them. The same goes for OTT cable alternatives like YouTube TV, Hulu + Live TV, Fubo and Sling TV – all are region-restricted to the US.

It can even happen with certain content on the likes of Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon Prime Video. They have slightly different libraries depending on which territory you're in. So you can forget watching The Great British Baking Show on Netflix if you're not Stateside.

And even if you find the show or sporting event on a local station, you may end up having to subscribe to stream. That hardly seems fair if you've already paid a premium back home to watch that exact same thing.

How can I watch US TV from overseas?

This is where having a good Netflix VPN or Peacock VPN can pay dividends.

The clever engineers at these VPN companies work constantly to make their tools compatible with the world's biggest streaming platforms, thereby letting you watch them regardless of where in the world you are.

The technology effectively spoofs your IP address so that your laptop, smartphone, tablet or streaming device looks like it's in an altogether different location.

Specifically, in this case, a location back within the USA.

Then, when you load up your app for Disney+, Apple TV, DirecTV or anything else, it will think you're back at home and so won't hit you with that annoying error message.

That's in theory, at least. Only the best streaming VPNs are able to unblock a wide range of these platforms. That's why it's worth making sure you get one that will come to your rescue when you're overseas on business or vacation...

Which is the best VPN for watching US TV when overseas?

Step-by-step guide on using a VPN to watch US TV overseas

Using a VPN to watch US TV when overseas is a doozy...

• Sign up and install a VPN on your device (NordVPN is our top pick)
• Connect to one of its United States servers
• Head to the website or app of the US streaming service you wish to use
• Hit play and enjoy!

We've learnt that it's best to connect to your US VPN server first before loading up the streaming app or website that you're attempting to unblock. We've found that if you do it the other way around (i.e. heading to the streaming platform first) you can, in effect, 'tip off' the streamer, which makes it less likely that the VPN will work its magic properly.

And another tip we have is to use an Incognito window you're streaming within a web browser. Again, it just helps to make sure that none of your cookies or usage history triggers the streaming platform to know that you're currently overseas.

What sports can I watch on US TV from overseas?

As a sports-mad nation, US TV hosts just about every event you can imagine from both home and abroad.

The NFL, NBA, NHL and MLB all go out on an intricate variation of networks and their associated streaming platforms. Anything that would normally be available on cable can also be watched on an OTT cord-cutting service.

Paramount Plus and Netflix are the respective homes of UFC and WWE, while Fox is the existing Nascar provider and has exclusive action from the 2026 FIFA World Cup. Apple TV has upped its game in recent years to win the rights to show MLS soccer and every race of the Formula 1 season.

Extensive coverage of the most recent Summer and Winter Olympic Games was carried by NBC's Peacock platform, as is Tour de France cycling.

In terms of overseas soccer, Peacock shows English Premier League matches, ESPN has La Liga from Spain and Bundesliga from Germany, and CBS carries the UEFA Champions League.

And what about sports that are traditionally less popular in the States? Dedicated platforms like RugbyPass and Willow TV respectively feature global rugby union and cricket action.

What news, dramas and comedy can I watch on US TV from overseas?

While some 24/7 rolling news casts will work wherever you are (e.g. Fox News, MS Now), others will not (e.g. NewsNation) without the use of a VPN.

Both current and prestige dramas can be streamed on an array of streaming platforms. George R. R. Martin's stories are an apposite example of this – Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon can be watched with a subscription to HBO Max. Peacock Originals include Ponies and The Five-Star Weekend, while Disney+ has plenty of Doctor Who.

Thankfully, most of the proprietary shows to land on Netflix and Apple TV can be watched from region to region. So the likes of Squid Game, Stranger Things and Severance can be streamed from pretty much anywhere.

It's a very similar situation in terms of comedies. Friends makes its home on HBO Max, while Seinfeld sits on Netflix and all seasons of Cheers are on Hulu. For something more contemporary, you'd need Paramount Plus for Colin from Accounts, Prime Video for Bait and Apple TV for Ted Lasso.

Just remember, if you're struggling to watch any of these when away from the country, you'll need to invest in a good VPN. They're more affordable than you might imagine.

• Meta reportedly has a new AI glasses prototype
• It is helping the company finalize a super sensing AI model
• Meta execs apparently aren't yet certain what rules the all seeing AI should follow

Meta is reportedly trialling a new super-sensing AI glasses prototype that aim to offer an ultimate level of assistance, for the small price of capturing your every moment.

The basic idea is that, because personal AI assistance gets better the more the AI knows you, by having you smart specs watch every detail of your life, the assistant can then offer more insightful help.

It could, for example, know if your fridge has milk in because it has seen inside it, or remind you not to forget your keys as you go to leave home. It could remember that gift your friend was desperately hoping to get for their birthday, or remind you the name of someone you’ve met before, if you're forgotten and are too embarrassed to ask.

This kind of tool would undeniably be pretty handy, but the extreme cost would be that your glasses would have to be always on — otherwise the AI might not see or hear the crucial information you’ll need later.

However, this incredible level of insight could be very easily abused — so you’d either have to really trust the company capturing it, or just not care if it knows everything about you.

This latest super-sensing leak comes via the Financial Times (behind a paywall) which reports that Meta is currently testing a pair of specs that achieve super-sensing by capturing continuous audio, and snapping photos every few seconds.

The more staccato image feed is likely an effort to conserve battery — according to previous leaks, existing Meta glasses have all the hardware they need to pull off super sensing, but their batteries wouldn’t be able to last long enough for it to be widely useful.

According to the report, Meta is also still trying to work on some other aspects, like whether the recording light LED should be displayed or not. When you’re recording it normally would be — super sense would be capturing people around you who might wish to know if they’re on camera — though sources have told the FT that there are plans for it to not to be displayed.

Considering that Meta just made a big post about privacy, and even updating the specs to disable tricks modders have been using to allow the specs to record without the light coming on, I’d be surprised if it took the no-light approach, but we’ll have to wait and see.

Man vs machine

You might also remember a story we shared in March about Meta contractors who claimed to be able to see images and videos taken with the glasses.

Essentially, in order to use Meta’s AI you agree to allow the company to see information about your AI communications, including videos and photos. This seemingly includes photos and videos you take using hands-free voice controls — which does technically involve Meta AI, as it has to action your request.

If an always-on AI is seeing every detail of your life there’s potentially a lot more scope for you to capture sensitive data that you'd rather not let Meta's contractors (or anyone else frankly) see. Encouragingly, according to people familiar with Meta’s super-sensing technology, there are plans to never store the raw footage and audio — meaning Meta nor the user could access it.

Instead, the system would extract the metadata from the capture, and only that would be uploaded — metadata is data about data, so imagine if instead of showing someone a photo you just described what’s in it and where it is.

There’s still some room for personal data to leak through this system, but with the correct safeguards it would have far fewer privacy implications. The big obvious gap would be the privacy of those around you — people who, unlike you the glasses wearer, might not have consented for Meta to store any kind of data about them.

The FT report adds there are also debates over whether Meta’s AI should be allowed to use this metadata for training purposes, in order for it to keep up with the capabilities of OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic’s models.

While leaks should be taken with a pinch of salt, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has made it clear that he wants to offer these kinds of features on his company’s glasses. Most recently he said in an investor call that he wants smart glasses “to be a personal agent that’s with you all day long, helping you remember things and achieve your goals.”

So the advent of technology like super-sense is most likely a matter of when not if, though with battery hardware constraints persisting (especially if you want slim and light glasses), and with privacy being such a hot-button issue, I expect it might be a while before we see super sense in action.

Whenever it arrives, we'll just have to hope that it’s implemented in the right way, and with appropriate safeguards. Such a tool could potentially offers some incredible accessibility benefits, but if the privacy cost is too great the I don’t see it taking off in the way I’m sure Meta would want it to.

Do you remember the metaverse? If you don’t, don’t worry. In 2026, four years into the AI revolution that’s changing the world forever, you could easily be forgiven for thinking it was a strange fever dream you had back in 2021. You might even have odd memories of seeing a blocky version of Mark Zuckerberg floating about in a Minecraft-inspired hellscape, conducting meetings with people who could walk with no legs, while the real Mark Zuckerberg was looking at the whole thing through VR goggles. At least, that’s my memory of it.

I could be suffering from the Mandela effect, but I distinctly remember something off about the legs. They fixed that in a later version, but that’s my overriding memory — no legs. Oh, and Mark Zuckerberg assuring us that this was the future. He’d spent tens of billions of dollars on it, even changing the company name from Facebook to Meta, just to let us know he was really serious about the metaverse. Even if the legs didn’t work.

The problem was, it looked laughable. While everything in the technology world to do with games and special effects was moving in the direction of hyper-realism, the metaverse was moving in the opposite direction, towards the sort of blocky graphics that small children enjoy. But even that didn’t really answer the most basic question about the metaverse. Why? What possible advantage was there for us all to meet in a VR space where clunky avatars of ourselves could interact… badly?

Then AI happened and Meta abruptly forgot about the metaverse and pivoted towards the mission of putting personal superintelligence in all our hands instead, which sounds as terrifying and dangerous as it actually is, but we are where we are. At least when Zuckerberg was obsessed with the metaverse, we could ignore him. It existed somewhere “over there”, in Meta-land, where we could let him get on with it. Now he’s right up in our business again.

The rise of a bad idea

I’ve always been fascinated by how Zuckerberg got into the metaverse and why he became so obsessed with it. The origins of the metaverse go way back. In March 2014, Facebook bought Oculus, the VR company, for about $2 billion. This was where his passion for VR started. Think of it as the seed, not the full obsession.

By July 2021, Zuckerberg gave a long interview to Casey Newton at The Verge about Facebook becoming a “metaverse company” and described it as an “embodied internet”. Then, on October 28, 2021, his obsession became the company identity. Zuckerberg announced that Facebook the company was becoming Meta at Connect 2021, saying the new company brand would focus on bringing the metaverse to life.

I can see the logic. As a business strategy, that made sense. As a product ordinary people were expected to use, it was much harder to understand. Zuckerberg did not want Meta/Facebook to be trapped inside someone else’s platform again. Facebook had won on social, but on mobile it remained dependent on Apple and Google for distribution, privacy rules, app-store policies and hardware. The metaverse looked like a chance to own the next operating system of social life: hardware, avatars, identity, payments, meetings, gaming, work, commerce — the whole stack. In his 2021 founder’s letter, he framed the metaverse as the “next chapter of the internet” and said Meta would become “metaverse-first, not Facebook-first.”

Facebook had obviously had its problems — it was scandal-ridden. It had let advertisers target vulnerable teenagers, helped fake news spread, and enabled the spread of hate speech linked to atrocities in Myanmar. Perhaps Zuckerberg was looking for a way out of Facebook, and the metaverse offered that.

What I still didn’t understand was why he didn’t see what the rest of us saw — that it looked terrible and offered no real benefit to users. Then I read Sarah Wynn-Williams’ tell-all book about Facebook, Careless People, and it all started to make sense.

To say the book made my jaw hit the floor on several occasions would be an understatement. It’s an absolute page-turner, and your reactions grow from mild amusement to shock, then disbelief, then absolute outrage the further through the book you get. I’m aware of the criticisms of Wynn-Williams: that it is a book written by a disgruntled employee, and that she dodges a lot of personal responsibility for her part in the various misdeeds of the company. However, in another perfect example of the Streisand effect, the fact that Meta obtained a legal order in the United States to prevent her from saying anything negative about the company — at all — made me want to pick it up, and I’m glad I did.

Because now I get it — Zuckerberg seems to have spent years in an environment where too few people were willing to tell him when his ideas weren’t good. According to Wynn-Williams, he was surrounded by sycophants. When he had bad ideas, like the ill-fated Internet.org, he wouldn’t let them go and persisted with them, even when they were obviously going to fail. The people around him enabled him because he was simply too powerful. They even let him win at the board games he liked to play with them at his house or on his jet, and — crucially — he didn’t notice that they were letting him win. I can imagine that in that environment, nobody inside Meta would want to tell Zuckerberg that his metaverse was the equivalent of the emperor’s new clothes, especially if they wouldn’t even risk beating him at Settlers of Catan.

Wynn-Williams only mentions the metaverse in her epilogue. It happened after she was brutally fired from Facebook. Perhaps selfishly, I wish she’d been there for the metaverse period, because I would love to read firsthand accounts of how and why Zuckerberg persisted with such an obviously bad idea.

The fall of the metaverse

Maybe I’m being too harsh on Zuckerberg. The metaverse graphics did get better over time and Apple ventured slightly into the same territory with its Apple Vision Pro, even after the metaverse had turned into a smoldering wasteland. The fact is, people don’t enjoy wearing VR goggles for extended periods of time, and for normal people, VR lacks that one killer app. There doesn’t seem to be anything you can do in a VR space that you can’t do elsewhere much more easily.

The metaverse didn’t really die with a bang, but with a whimper. It faded through layoffs, spending cuts and the AI pivot. If I had to put a date on it, I’d say early 2023 was when Meta’s narrative moved on. In February and March 2023, Zuckerberg started talking about Meta’s “year of efficiency” and announced huge layoffs and cost-cutting. OpenAI had launched ChatGPT in November 2022, and by early 2023, generative AI had swallowed the oxygen that ideas like the metaverse need to survive. Every tech company was talking about AI now, not virtual offices and avatar legs.

The metaverse was over. We all forgot about it and moved on.

I’m glad I read Wynn-Williams’ book, because now I can understand how Facebook let the metaverse happen. And if there’s one thing I learned from reading it, it’s that money and power can bring you a lot of things, but common sense requires neither.

A study has revealed that approximately 40% of UK employees receive ‘work slop’ caused by low-quality, AI-generated content. As a result, it is estimated that each instance of work slop takes up to 3.5 hours each month to correct, resulting in millions of pounds in lost productivity.

It has been reported that as of mid-2026, approximately 78% of global businesses are using AI in at least one business function.

Despite this, studies have revealed that 62% to over 80% of workers lack confidence or training in AI, with many reporting they don’t have the skills to use the tool in their daily tasks, which can lead to errors and work slop.

What is AI work slop?

Many workers are using AI to make daily tasks such as generating reports, emails, or code more efficient. However, if used incorrectly, workers can be faced with low-quality, AI-generated content that may look like a high standard at first glance, but after closer inspection, is inaccurate and requires hours of manual checking and corrections.

To minimize AI work slop, there are several steps businesses can take:

Make training a key objective: It’s inevitable that without appropriate training and guidance using AI software, errors will occur. Business owners should ensure that employees are trained in more efficient prompting and understanding AI limitations to reduce work slop. If training is implemented during the employee onboarding stage or as early in the project as possible, the chances of work slop will be significantly reduced.

Start by brainstorming: AI must be used to enhance work, not to create it on its own. Before completing tasks that incorporate AI, it’s important to brainstorm how it can be used and the objectives you want to achieve. Where possible, create the bulk of content from scratch and use AI to support and enhance the end goal.

Introduce a review process: AI-generated work should never be presented to senior stakeholders or clients unless checked by an experienced team member. Business owners should ensure that all AI-generated tasks are reviewed and fact-checked before being presented as the final version.

An effective method is to create a mindset that AI-generated work has been created by an intern who has little knowledge of the industry. Reviewing work using this method will help to spot errors faster.

Encourage transparency: To reduce AI work slop, business owners should encourage workers to use AI to support and enhance tasks, not to complete them altogether. It’s also important for workers to be clear about how AI has supported the tasks they’re working on to make the reviewing process more efficient.

Encourage team feedback: One of the main ways to prevent continued work slop is to make colleagues aware that it has been spotted. More often than not, people will correct mistakes themselves, rather than be transparent and provide constructive feedback to their peers. Raising work slop in the early stages of the project will save time and prevent the issue from recurring.

Create manageable workloads: Workers who are unable to manage their workloads will often complete tasks quickly using AI, which can result in work slop. To prevent this, promote quality over quantity throughout the business and ensure that unmanageable workloads don’t hinder this ethos.

The key to AI success

For businesses using AI, the software should be used to elevate work and make processes more efficient, not cause delays and errors. If your business is looking to adopt AI, it’s important to be transparent with employees about when to use it and when to avoid it.

Employees should have a strong mindset towards AI and have quality and value in mind at all times when understanding the outcomes they’d like to achieve. When planning tasks, we should ask ourselves: Will AI add value and additional insights to the project, and how will it move your goals forward?

Once these points have been considered, it’s important to understand what AI can’t assist with, such as human perspective and strategic creativity. If you decide to use AI for the task you’re looking to complete, which is weighted towards human-powered thought and creativity, this is when work slop can be encountered, resulting in wasted time and resources.

To summarize, AI should be used to generate valuable content and results. Asking yourself the questions mentioned above before you turn to the software will help to generate the best possible outcomes.

An effective mental model that helps to prevent work slop

Before employees can use AI responsibly, they need to understand what it actually does. In "AI for Startup Leaders," we present a framework called A-R-C that captures the three core capabilities of AI:

• Agency: AI can work with tools, run code, and complete tasks on an employee’s behalf. For example, it can query data from your CRM, draft documents, or update a spreadsheet.
• Reasoning: AI can plan ahead and think through problems step-by-step. The latest models can break down complex challenges, consider multiple approaches, and work through logic chains.
• Context: AI can base its answers on the information you provide in each conversation. It can understand natural language, identify objects in photos, and parse data in spreadsheets.

The A-R-C model is crucial, as many workers use AI as an encyclopedia and to state facts, which isn’t what the software was created for. When people rely on AI for facts, work slop can occur. To avoid this, workers should be educated on the main purpose of AI, reasoning over their business context and taking action.

When employees understand A-R-C, they approach AI outputs differently. They recognize that AI is best used to reason from their business context rather than look up answers. Instead, they use AI to speed up how they collaborate with other teams and improve efficiency.

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For the past year, one idea has dominated conversations about enterprise technology: AI agents will replace Software as a Service (SaaS). It’s a compelling case on paper. If AI can reason across tools, write code, execute workflows, and interact with systems through APIs, then traditional SaaS applications start to look like unnecessary middlemen.

Seats become less relevant. User interfaces matter less. Software becomes cheaper to build. Custom internal tools become easier to create.

In that reality, much of SaaS gets pushed down into infrastructure, while value shifts to models, agents, and orchestration layers. This reaction is being driven by several parallel shifts.

Software is becoming cheaper and faster to build, AI agents are becoming better at navigating tools and executing work across systems, and the economics of agentic execution are bringing new attention to cost and latency, or time to serve.

The market is not wrong to think this way. AI agents will change software economics.

They will push platforms to become API-first, deeply connected, and capable of supporting autonomous activity at scale. They will challenge seat-based pricing and accelerate the move towards consumption and outcome-based models. They will expose weak products and reward systems that are trusted, extensible, and embedded in real operations.

This is the next phase of SaaS, rather than the end of it.

From replacement to expansion

The assumption behind the “end of SaaS” narrative is that software exists primarily as an interface. If agents can bypass that interface, the application becomes redundant. That logic holds for some categories of software, but it does not apply uniformly. Enterprise software has never been just a presentation layer.

Enterprise platforms derive their value from managing structured data, enforcing permissions, executing workflows, and maintaining the audit trails organizations rely on. Agentic AI does not remove that requirement; in many cases, it sharpens it. What AI changes is not whether these capabilities are needed, but which types of software are most exposed as agents become more capable.

Products whose value is largely defined by navigation, basic interaction, or shallow workflows are more vulnerable when agents can reason directly over APIs and complete tasks without human mediation. More configurable, deeply integrated platforms behave differently.

Solutions that act as systems of record, coordinate workflows across services, apply policy, manage state, and provide security, auditability, and evidencing are not easily displaced. Their role is not simply to present functionality, but to ensure work is executed consistently, safely, and at scale.

In that context, AI agents are not replacing platforms so much as being embedded within them, extending how work is initiated, coordinated, and completed. That direction is already visible in the data.

Gartner forecasts that by 2030, 85% of enterprise agentic AI investments will be bundled into existing SaaS and cloud renewals rather than delivered through net-new contracts, up from 55% in 2025.

SaaS as the execution and control layer

As agents become more capable, they shift where value sits and how platforms compete.

For years, software differentiation has been driven by features and user experience. In an agent-driven world, those differences begin to matter less. Agents can move across systems, access functions directly, and orchestrate tasks programmatically.

What matters instead is which platforms can actually complete work. This means coordinating processes across systems, applying the right type of automation at each step, and ensuring outcomes are reliable, traceable, and compliant.

In this model, SaaS does not disappear. It becomes the execution and control layer for enterprise AI. As this shift plays out, value and margin move away from individual features and towards the platforms that control execution and data access. Agents themselves are unlikely to be a sustainable point of differentiation. As capabilities converge, the focus moves towards control.

That’s because enterprise processes still need to be predictable, auditable, and, in many cases, reversible. Regulatory frameworks are reinforcing this, with increasing expectations around explainability and oversight. This places new importance on the platforms that sit at the center of operations.

Organizations that can orchestrate work across systems, apply automation selectively, and produce a clear evidence trail will capture more value over time. Those that cannot risk becoming passive data stores, rather than active systems of execution.

A multiplier effect on demand

There is another misconception shaping the conversation that AI will reduce the amount of work organizations need to do and, with it, the reliance on software.

In practice, the opposite is happening. As the cost and effort required to execute processes falls, more work becomes viable. More cases are identified, more customer needs are addressed, and more processes are triggered automatically.

We are already seeing this in service environments, where AI-driven detection and automation increase the volume of actionable work entering the system.

In the context of public services, for example, within a case management environment, a missed bin, pothole, or housing repair issue can be identified automatically, raised as a case instantly, and routed into the right workflow without waiting for a citizen or staff member to log it manually. In that model, the value sits not in who created the case, but in how effectively the platform absorbs, processes and resolves it.

This creates a multiplier effect. AI does not just reduce effort; it expands what organizations can do. AI expands demand, and SaaS platforms are where that demand is fulfilled.

The question is no longer how many users a platform supports. It is how much work it can handle, complete, and evidence effectively.

What this means for SaaS platforms

This shift will not benefit every platform equally.

As software moves from presenting information to completing work, value becomes tied to what a system can actually deliver, not just how it is accessed. This will also shape commercial models, with more platforms likely to combine traditional subscriptions with pricing based on consumption, throughput, or completed outcomes.

Organizations still need oversight, approvals, and ways to manage exceptions, but the focus is shifting towards how effectively platforms can absorb, process, and complete work at scale.

That change is already exposing the gap between strong and weak software, placing greater scrutiny on systems that offer limited workflow depth or rely heavily on manual effort. In contrast, platforms that are deeply embedded in operations, with strong data, logic, and execution capabilities, will become more valuable.

As agents become consumers of APIs, software needs to be connected and capable of supporting autonomous activity at scale. Those that are not will struggle to keep up.

The next phase of SaaS

Ultimately, what we are seeing is not the end of SaaS, but an evolution. SaaS is being reshaped, not just as software for human interaction, but as software designed for both humans and machines operating across systems.

A shift from systems that present information to systems that complete work. From user-driven interaction to orchestrated execution, and feature competition to control over how processes run.

This is not theoretical. It is already happening. Low-code platforms and productivity tools are being augmented by AI and agentic workflows, changing how applications are built, adapted, and used day to day.

But this shift also raises the bar for how organizations adopt AI. Those that simply layer agents onto existing processes risk creating more complexity rather than less. Introducing automation without understanding how work really flows can make outcomes harder to predict and harder to evidence, particularly in regulated environments.

The organizations that succeed will start with a real operational problem and introduce AI selectively. Where existing workflows provide sufficient structure and control, value can be delivered quickly without redesign. Where AI exposes friction or inefficiency, that insight can then inform targeted process improvement.

AI agents amplify the platforms beneath them; they do not replace them.

The result is not less software, but different software, running on platforms built to execute work, absorb demand, and stay in control. More automation, more cases handled, more throughput, more outcomes achieved through systems that reliably complete more work at scale.

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• A new update is coming to Meta's smart glasses
• It should stop modders from disabling the light that lets people know you're using the camera
• Meta is also targeting modders on and off its platform

Last month we shared details of reports that Meta glasses were being modded to bypass privacy protections and turn them into secret spy glasses. Now Meta has revealed it will update the glasses’ software to detect whether its light has been tampered with (or destroyed) to prevent recording.

Whenever you take a photo or video with Meta glasses, a white light appears on the front of the glasses to signal to people around you that you’re filming.

For creeps looking to be more secretive with their recordings, this light is a hindrance, but Meta has imposed more basic tamper-proof features since launch. That is, any attempt to use the camera while the light is blocked — such as by a piece of tape — wouldn’t be allowed. The trouble is, modders have found ways to open up the glasses and disable or damage the light and its mechanisms that prevent it from showing, without getting flagged by the system — meaning you can use the camera as you normally would, but without anyone else knowing.

This is (to put it bluntly) not good, and when the reports came out, a Meta spokesperson told me that the company was looking into ways to disable this workaround.

They also explained that Meta is working hard to stamp out advertisements for these kinds of services — some of which appeared on its own Facebook Marketplace platform — with its latest announcement explaining this means banning accounts, taking down listings, and taking legal action against people or businesses that tamper with its tech.

Beyond the detail of updating software to prevent tampering, the whole article from Meta is focused on privacy, and crucially how Meta keeps you and others safe.

Thanks to people misusing its tech, the wider notoriety these gadgets are getting again, and reports of contractors seeing recorded images and videos that Meta glasses users might not have fully realized they could see, Meta and smart glasses makers have been facing major privacy questions.

With this article, Meta seems to answer many of them, though we’ll have to wait and see if it can convince users — or if they might be tempted by the rise of cameraless smart glasses.

The only way is cameraless?

Even Realities, another smart glasses firm, recently announced it has raised $150 million in investment at a $1 billion valuation — not too shabby for a company that only launched its first XR gadget in 2024.

Instead of Meta’s camera-first approach, Even Realities went for a display-first approach. Information is shown visually as green text and basic diagrams to provide features such as AI advice, navigational directions, or a speech appearing on a virtual prompter. Its specs also lack speakers, though that’s not true for all glasses of their kind.

Losing out on the camera is, of course, a major privacy win for some, as there’s no possible way for the glasses to see something they shouldn’t or be used to spy.

The thing is, I think these kinds of glasses are pretty terrible. Having tested a few at home, the ones without a camera just aren’t worth wearing.

Smart glasses, despite being increasingly popular, are in their infancy, which in the tech world means you can expect to pay a fair sum for relatively limited features — that’s the price of being an early adopter. That’s especially true, I’ve found, for these XR glasses specifically, because while they can offer several tools like navigation, on-screen translations, a prompter, and notification pop-ups, their usefulness is pretty limited.

How often do you need a prompter? Or one-way translation tools? In the case of the latter, because these kinds of glasses often have you rely on your phone to set up the translation feature or access other features, you might as well just turn to something like Google Translate — which has conversation modes so that two people can talk and see translations through a single device.

The software I’ve found for these types of specs can also be pretty terrible with sluggishness, inaccuracies, and crashes — and if I, as someone who tests smart glasses professionally, have trouble, I can’t imagine what less techy people must think.

Additionally, the green text can be hard to make out on a bright day if you’re outside, making on-screen directions difficult to see.

While admittedly more limited feature-wise, the Meta glasses and smart specs like them feel like way better value for money. From Meta specifically, the software is generally very reliable, and more broadly, the ability to snap a photo whenever — either to capture a moment or to provide context for an AI’s response — comes in handy so often.

Even if it isn’t as good as my phone camera, the ability to record a memory, hands-free and without being taken out of the moment, is so utterly delightful.

Yes, there are privacy challenges which need to be hashed out more formally, as even without the ability to record privately there is still plenty of room for creeps to harass people with this kind of gadget, but if you want a pair of smart glasses right now there simply isn’t a better option.

“Tokenmaxxing” – the idea that AI coding success comes down to using as many tokens as possible – is an appealing metric.

Tokens are the fundamental unit that AI coding tools use to read, write, and reason. So on the surface, more tokens should mean more output, more productivity, and more impact.

But when we analyzed 12,000 developers across 200 companies, the data revealed that while more tokens do correlate with more output, they come at a significantly higher price per unit.

Some organizations are pushing software engineers to use as many tokens as possible, using leaderboards to promote the biggest AI users. But that’s not a sustainable strategy. CFOs are starting to push back on uncontrolled AI spending and asking coders to show receipts.

Leaders may be willing to spend money to move fast, but they can’t do it without proving their engineering teams are having an impact.

The best approach to “toxenmaxxing” isn’t to blindly push for AI adoption. Instead, the best path forward for companies is to push AI coding adoption more broadly, moving more engineers into the middle of the curve while avoiding both underuse and expensive overconsumption.

Why ‘tokenmaxxing’ doesn’t scale

We found that the top 10% of Claude Code users consumed about 10 times as many AI tokens as the median developer but produced only about twice the output. In other words, increasing token consumption does increase output, but not proportionally.

The research also shows a small but growing group of power users dominating total token consumption. At the 90th percentile, users are burning around 225M tokens per week, about 3x what they were using six months ago, and about 7x the median.

Many engineering leaders are now looking at their highest adopters and trying to figure out how to get the rest of the organization to the same level. That approach is misguided. With the cost per merged PR increasing from $0.28 at the lowest adoption tier to $89.32 at the highest, scaling extreme token usage simply cannot drive value.

Instead, engineering leaders should focus on smoothing the curve. Broad, moderate token consumption is far more cost effective than having a small group of power users at one end of the spectrum and everyone else lagging behind. When most of the organization is operating in the middle of the curve, AI becomes a durable advantage: enough to drive real productivity gains but not so much that engineering teams burn money chasing marginal output.

Maximize impact, not token consumption

The organizations that burn through the most tokens aren't necessarily getting the furthest with AI. When token consumption is high, most are spent on automating manual tasks with tools like Claude, Copilot or Cursor. Developers essentially have a better tool to do the same kind of work as they did before.

To really drive impact with AI, engineering organizations need to move towards new, truly agentic modes of working. However, agentic systems require major investments in IT infrastructure, including context engineering, orchestration, and sandboxed environments. Until organizations address these issues, the productivity gains will remain blocked by an "agentic barrier" that no amount of tokens can overcome.

How established enterprises can follow the AI-native lead

Conversations around AI and software development focus on coding, but writing code is just one part of an engineer's role. Taking a product to market also involves roadmap work, deployment, go-to-market enablement, and more. If engineers are spending tons of tokens on writing code as fast as possible, everything else needs to catch up.

Changing roadmap cadence and accelerating sales enablement requires major cultural shifts that many organizations aren't prepared for. As a result, extra cadences are often poured into the backlog or other things that may deliver value down the line but won't move the revenue needle in the short term. Teams can consume millions of tokens every week but have little to show for it by the end of the quarter.

AI-native companies are more likely to see an immediate return on their AI investments. While established enterprises may not be able to start from scratch, adopting AI-native principles can help remove bottlenecks and turn token spend into measurable business returns faster. By designing workflows with automation in mind, they can continue to accelerate coding without creating technical debt.

"Tokenmaxxing" is having a moment, but engineering leaders need to move beyond token count and start finding ways to prove value. By measuring how AI impacts delivery, quality, and productivity across the software delivery life cycle, leaders can demonstrate ROI and make sure every token counts.

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• Microsoft's new Windows 11 recovery method is available for Windows Insiders
• Cloud Rebuild allows users to reinstall Windows 11 and necessary drivers via the cloud, without a USB drive
• The feature should begin rolling out to users on stable Windows 11 builds

Microsoft is continually making adjustments to its Windows 11 operating system through patches that address user pain points, and, fortunately, its latest move is certainly welcome.

As reported by Windows Central, Microsoft has implemented a new recovery method for Windows 11, known as Cloud Rebuild, which is available to Windows Insider users. Cloud Rebuild allows users to reinstall the operating system and drivers from the cloud without the need for a USB drive.

It's a major step in the right direction for users who need to reset their PCs, whether due to data corruption, malware, or simply wanting to start anew, especially since not all users have immediate access to another device to download a Windows image or a USB drive to install it on.

Unlike the Windows Recovery Environment's 'Reset this PC' option, Cloud Rebuild doesn't allow you to keep personal files, but Microsoft says Cloud Rebuild reinstalls Windows with the appropriate drivers and "without depending on the integrity of the installed operating system".

Notably, Cloud Rebuild can still work when users can't boot into Windows 11, making life easier in a dire situation where the operating system is dysfunctional.

Perhaps the biggest advantage of Cloud Rebuild is for the acquisition of drivers, saving users plenty of time from manual downloads. This comes in handy for Windows 11 handheld gaming PCs, where reinstalling drivers can be slightly complicated, especially without the necessary peripherals being on hand for quick and easy navigation.

Cloud Rebuild isn't available to all Windows users yet, but the gradual rollout phase shouldn't be too far off. Fortunately, it's not a feature that most users urgently require (at least, I hope), so the wait for its arrival in stable Windows 11 updates shouldn't be frustrating.

How many unique passwords do you use to secure every single one of your hundreds of online accounts? If your answer isn't, "I have a strong unique password for every account," then you're among the millions of people at risk of having multiple accounts stolen from just a single password leak. All it takes is the right combination.

But that doesn't have to be the case. Using a password manager to generate and store your credentials is a secure and convenient way to prevent your accounts from being hacked. The best part is, Keeper has cut prices on its personal, family, and business starter plans by up to 50%.

Keeper's password manager offers secured password storage vaults, a password generator that easily complies with password strength requirements, and includes convenient features for privately sharing regularly used passwords - like the one for the Wi-Fi.

Why we recommend Keeper

Our Keeper review found the password manager to be an excellent addition to anyone wanting to improve their personal or household security.

The service uses zero knowledge architecture and device level encryption to keep the contents of your personal vault hidden from private eyes.

Rather than having to enter your master password each time you need to fill in your credentials, Keeper uses biometric security to access your vault. This uses the built in facial scan or fingerprint tech on your device. Keeper will also recognize when you are trying to log in to a website or app, and allow you to autofill the exact credentials you need.

Four households, the family plan includes five private vaults, allowing you to quickly share Wi-Fi or streaming passwords using Keeper's shared vaults.

These discounts apply to the first year only, so the value is highest for new customers or anyone switching from a monthly plan. After that, pricing goes back to standard rates.

MacPaw has spent years building a reputation as one of the most design-conscious developers in the Mac ecosystem. Its flagship product, CleanMyMac, has long included a malware removal module powered by Moonlock's engine. In October 2025, the Kyiv-based company spun that security technology into a standalone product: Moonlock, a full-featured antivirus app that goes well beyond a simple scanner.

Rather than leading with threat counts and detection percentages, Moonlock frames itself as security software that treats users like adults, explaining what malware is, why it matters, and what to do next, instead of firing off opaque alerts. The marketing centers on a 'care, not scare' approach, essentially promising to educate you rather than just bombarding you with red-text alerts.

While many live in the mythical belief that Macs are immune to viruses, MacPaw's own research reports that 66 percent of Mac users encountered at least one cyber threat last year, with a 67% increase in registered macOS backdoor variants in 2025. The research shows a key message: macOS is not immune, are users are being targeted more frequently than ever.

Plans and pricing

Moonlock starts at $54 per year for a single Mac, with licenses available for 2, 5, or more than 10 devices per subscription. Monthly billing and one-time lifetime license options are also available for those who prefer not to commit to an annual cycle.

Discounts of up to 67 percent are advertised on multi-year plans, which is worth exploring if you intend to stick with the product long term.

New users get a seven-day free trial, though a credit card is required to start. That is a common enough practice, but it does mean you will need to remember to cancel if the product does not suit you. To soften the blow of that annual fee, Moonlock offers a 30-day money-back guarantee, which is a considerably more generous safety net than the case-by-case refund process offered by some competitors.

Current Setapp subscribers get access to Moonlock at no additional charge, which may be the most compelling value proposition for those already in MacPaw's subscription ecosystem. At $54 per year for a single device, standalone pricing lands considerably higher than ClamXAV's three-Mac Home plan at $29.95, a gap worth weighing if budget is a primary concern.

Features

Moonlock is organized into six sections: Home, Malware Scanner, VPN, Network Inspector, System Protection, and Security Advisor. That framework reflects a deliberate decision to bundle a security suite rather than deliver a focused antivirus, giving the product a notably broader footprint than Mac-only rivals like ClamXAV.

Real-time protection runs continuously in the background, monitoring file activity, app behavior, and Mail attachments even when the main application window is closed. The Malware Scanner supports on-demand and scheduled scans, with built-in quarantine and removal tools. Detected threats are accompanied by plain-language explanations rather than raw file paths and specialized terms.

The bundled VPN is a simplified version of MacPaw's ClearVPN, covering around 60 server locations across more than 45 countries. Independent testing found no DNS or WebRTC leaks, and MacPaw maintains a no-logging policy. Speed retention is strong, holding around 82 percent of baseline download speeds on transatlantic connections and up to 96 percent on closer servers.

Network Inspector adds a country-level connection blocker, permitting users to block outbound traffic to specific regions. System Protection audits macOS's own built-in security settings and walks you through any gaps. Finally, Security Advisor provides a checklist for basic digital hygiene, including practical guidance on habits such as two-factor authentication and app permissions. AI assists with malware classification on the backend, helping the team update threat databases before new strains reach your device.

Privacy and Security

From a top level perspective, Moonlock was tested by the third-party laboratory AV-Test in September 2025 and earned it's AV-Test certification. It scored a 5.5/6 in Protection, 4.5/6 in Performance, and a full 6/6 for Usability (which I'll dive into in the next section).

As for the credibility of the underlying research arm, Moonlock Lab has made several notable contributions to the antivirus landscape, being the first to identify PyStealer on VirusTotal, and the lab has also been cited by the SANS Institute for discovering new variants of the Atomic macOS infostealer.

Regarding privacy, the VPN operates under a strict zero-logs policy, and all data is processed locally. MacPaw publishes a Trust Center at security.macpaw.com describing its data-handling practices, certifications, and security standards, which is a nice change in transparency from many other antivirus providers.

The one caveat worth noting is that Moonlock is a recent standalone launch. While the underlying engine has been in use in CleanMyMac for some time, the app itself has a limited history as an independently tested product. But it is worth noting that in the time since the last time AV-Test handled Moonlock, MacPaw have likely taken steps to improve protection and performance.

Interface and in use

The interface is highly polished, modern, and immediately legible, with a two-panel home dashboard that separates tasks on the left from status information on the right. Everything is where you would expect it to be, and the visual hierarchy makes it easy to tell at a glance whether your Mac is protected.

Instead of a generic 'Threat Resolved' notification, Moonlock tells you what was found, why it poses a risk, and what your options are. I found I was the one to make the final call on whether to remove a flagged item, which sidesteps the infuriating experience of automated deletion that occasionally catches legitimate software.

The system requirements make it suitable for older devices too, requiring macOS 13 or later and 515MB of disk space. The app runs quickly and, in day-to-day use, does not noticeably drag on performance. Installation requires a MacPaw account, which adds a step that competitors like ClamXAV skip entirely for home users, but the tradeoff is a unified login for managing licenses and accessing support.

Ultimately, Moonlock is a great option for those looking for an accessible and easily navigable Mac antivirus that doesn't bombard you with any overly-technical language, and performs as though you are the one in control.

Support

Moonlock support runs on MacPaw's established infrastructure, with a dedicated knowledge base that covers installation, configuration, and troubleshooting, and those with questions can submit immediate inquiries through the support portal. In-app feedback is also available via the Help menu.

As with many Mac-focused security products, live chat or phone support does not appear to be offered as a standard option. For most home users, the knowledge base and email channel will be sufficient. Teams with more complicated environments should verify support response times before committing, particularly given that Moonlock is a relatively new standalone product and the support documentation is still maturing.

The competition

ClamXAV is the most direct rival in the Mac-exclusive antivirus space. At $29.95 per year for three devices, it is considerably cheaper than Moonlock's $54 single-device starting price, and it also holds a perfect AV-Test score compared to Moonlock's test results. It does not include a VPN, network inspection, or the polished onboarding experience Moonlock offers, but for those who want focused antivirus protection at a lower cost, it is a strong option.

Intego Mac Internet Security X9 sits at a comparable price point and includes a network monitor, with a longer track record in independent third-party testing. Bitdefender Total Security and Norton AntiVirus Plus both offer wider platform coverage and larger feature sets, making them better fits for households with mixed Windows and Mac devices.

Those who are already subscribed to CleanMyMac should also note that its built-in malware-scanning module, powered by the same Moonlock engine, continues to function independently. Therefore the question is whether the full Moonlock standalone app adds enough to justify an additional subscription or an upgrade in spending.

Final verdict

Moonlock is one of the most carefully designed security apps I've encountered in the Mac ecosystem. Its interface is excellent, its feature set is broader than most Mac-specific alternatives, and the research team behind it is doing genuinely credible original work. The 30-day money-back guarantee is also a nice addition, despite the need to enter your payment details first.

At $54 per year for a single Mac, it costs nearly twice as much as ClamXAV's three-device plan. The added value of the bundled VPN and Network Inspector goes some way toward justifying that gap, but those who already have a VPN solution elsewhere may not find the extras compelling enough. Setapp subscribers, on the other hand, get all of this for free as part of a subscription they likely already value.

For long-standing CleanMyMac users who already benefit from the embedded Moonlock engine, the standalone app offers greater depth, visibility, and control, but it's not a replacement for anything missing. It is a fuller version of the protection they have already been relying on, now with a VPN, richer reporting, and a proper home for the security features that were previously contained within a Mac cleaning utility.

For Mac users who want a single subscription that covers antivirus, VPN, network monitoring, and system security guidance, Moonlock makes a strong argument. Just go in aware of what you are paying for relative to the alternatives.

You might also be interested in our report on the best Mac apps of the year.

Walk deep into Walt Disney Imagineering’s sprawling, surprisingly unassuming Glendale campus, and you’ll eventually find Studio C.

It’s where Imagineering mixes the audio for its attractions, but when I recently stepped inside, I quickly realized it was much more than a recording studio. The room is lined with dozens upon dozens of speakers designed to recreate the sound field of Disney attractions, letting Imagineers hear a ride long before guests ever do.

During my visit, I watched a live mix session for Zootopia: Hot Pursuit, Shanghai Disneyland’s trackless dark ride, and the experience was almost uncanny. Sound moved seamlessly around the room, tracking the ride vehicle as though I were actually inside the attraction.

That same room became the proving ground for one of Imagineering’s most unusual engineering challenges yet: figuring out how to mix the audio for Soarin’ Across America.

The reimagined version of Disney’s iconic flight simulator debuted this summer at both EPCOT at Walt Disney World in Orlando, Florida, and Disney California Adventure in Anaheim, California, timed for America’s Semiquincentennial celebration. Disney’s Unscripted behind-the-scenes video confirmed that Imagineers used the Apple Vision Pro during production of Soarin’ Across America, but it left one obvious question unanswered: why? That’s what I wanted to find out.

So I spoke with Greg Lhotka, Sr. Manager, Audio Media Design at Walt Disney Imagineering, who walked me through the surprisingly complicated process behind mixing one of Disney’s most technically demanding attractions.

“For Soarin’ Across America, we utilized Studio C not only as a production facility, but as a proving ground for an entirely new field-mixing approach developed specifically for this film. On the sound design side, we partnered with Skywalker Sound, and together we used Studio C to prototype and validate a custom speaker configuration that closely mirrors the unique audio architecture of the Soarin’ theaters.”

If you’ve ridden Soarin’, you already know why that matters. Riders are lifted into the air in three stacked rows facing a massive curved projection screen, while sound moves not only around the theater but above and below you as well. As Lhotka explained, the attraction uses a four-tiered speaker system — upper, mid-level, lower, and a dedicated floor array — creating an audio environment that’s far more complex than a traditional movie theater.

Having now ridden Soarin’ Across America several times, it’s easy to appreciate the result. The updated film sweeps from New York Harbor and the Grand Canyon to California’s rolling hills and countless landscapes in between through soaring aerial cinematography, practical effects, and a soundtrack that glides almost effortlessly alongside you. The audio shifts just as fluidly as the visuals, making each transition feel natural as the ride carries you across some of America’s most recognizable landmarks and scenic vistas.

Studio C could simulate much of that during production, but not all of it.

“For Soarin’ films, mixing historically required the construction of scaffolding inside the theater to reach the appropriate listening height for final mix decisions,” Lhotka explained. “Even then, the process was far from ideal, as the ride canopy significantly influences the acoustics. For this project, one of the key requirements was that the theater remain fully operational and open to guests throughout production — eliminating the possibility of scaffolding altogether.”

That constraint forced Imagineering to rethink its entire workflow.

“The challenge was clear: how do you mix a show with over 1,000 audio tracks and an extremely complex panning matrix while seated in a ride vehicle? The solution came through an innovative use of new AR technologies. By leveraging advanced screen-sharing capabilities, we were able to remotely control our production system — directly connected to the theater — while seated in the ride vehicle itself. This allowed us to place virtual screens in our field of view, effectively bringing the mixing console into the theater environment.”

Before anyone tested it inside the attraction, Studio C became the test lab.

“Studio C once again played a critical role as our testbed. Over the course of a week, we evaluated multiple configurations to confirm that things could be controlled precisely in this way, and that the AR headset’s external cameras would allow us to view the film clearly in the theater’s low-light conditions while simultaneously monitoring the virtual screens. The final configuration exceeded expectations.”

Once validated, the workflow moved from experiment to production.

“This workflow was ultimately used as the solution — and it became the method by which Soarin’ Across America was mixed. The result is a soundtrack that was shaped directly from the guest’s perspective, using tools and techniques that reflect our continued commitment to innovation, immersion, and storytelling.”

Having experienced Studio C for myself, that revelation immediately clicked. The room is already designed to recreate the feeling of sitting inside a Disney attraction with remarkable accuracy. But even a purpose-built facility couldn’t perfectly replicate Soarin’s unique acoustics. The only place left to finish the mix was inside the attraction itself.

It’s an elegant solution that solved two problems at once. Guests never lost access to Soarin’ during production, and Imagineering’s audio team was able to shape the soundtrack from the exact seat every future rider would occupy. Rather than approximating the experience from scaffolding or even Studio C, the final mix was crafted where it mattered most: inside the attraction itself.

For the past year or so, predictions of SaaS's demise have dominated the tech conversation.

Headlines warned that AI tools would replace traditional software, engineers would become obsolete and the SaaS industry itself was headed for extinction.

The narrative became so widespread that Wall Street gave it a name: the ‘SaaSpocalypse’.

Fortunately, reality has proved far less dramatic.

While the SaaS market - once the darling of investors - has undoubtedly taken a substantial hit, it is a long way from dead. In fact, I would argue that software doesn't die; it evolves.

If history has taught us anything, then it’s that major technology shifts rarely eliminate software altogether. Instead, they reshape it, with the biggest winners often being those agile enough to adapt.

From the rise of the internet to the shift to cloud computing, time and time again we’ve seen established players demonstrate an ability to evolve alongside technological change.

The AI era is unlikely to be any different.

SaaS subsectors best positioned to unlock AI-enabled growth

And I’m not alone in this view. Over recent months a number of high-profile economists, technology historians and analysts have arrived at that same conclusion. JPMorgan continues to champion the SaaS subsectors best positioned to unlock AI-enabled growth. Meanwhile, Goldman Sachs projects the global app software market could still reach $780bn by 2030, with agentic AI ultimately expanding the market rather than shrinking it.

Put bluntly, AI isn’t killing SaaS but rather separating the bad from the good. For years, SaaS startups have benefited from intense market hype and lofty valuations, often with minimum regard given to operational efficiencies, product differentiation or true value creation. Today that playing field looks a lot different. In effect, AI is now acting as a filter, revealing which SaaS models are superior and offer a genuine point of differentiation and, in turn, those which have for far too long favored style over substance.

For SaaS founders then, it isn’t time to panic. In our experience, investors-in-the-know will be more than willing to overlook the misguided SaaS narrative and recognize a genuine high potential opportunity should it arise.

Take, for example, the mid-market. Although much focus tends to surround the startup scene, I would argue that established software vendors are actually best positioned for AI transformation. After all, they already possess powerful structural advantages, including proprietary customer data, deeply embedded workflows and long-term contracts.

Moreover, they often sit on years of customer data. In this way, unlike startups where the focus is typically product, these firms actually have something meaningful to transform.

Well positioned to use AI to strengthen their market position

Far from becoming obsolete overnight, many are well positioned to use AI to strengthen their market position. Take, for example, Keyword.com. Having early recognized that search itself is changing, it launched a product to track brand visibility across AI platforms like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini. That repositioning opened up an entirely new growth vector.

In terms of how founders can best navigate this new terrain, it’s important to look beyond product and focus on structural resilience. For a long time, SaaS benefited from assumptions such as high multiples on ARR, heavy adjustments for stock-based compensation, and a willingness to prioritize growth over almost everything else.

That is now being replaced by a much more grounded framework. Investors are increasingly looking at real profitability, on a GAAP basis, and asking harder questions about cost structure, for example around sales and marketing efficiency, and now AI-related compute costs as well.

At the same time, as founders will be aware AI is introducing new variables. Revenue may be less predictable if it’s usage-based, and margins can be more dynamic because of inference costs, meaning investors won’t simply rely on simple rules of thumb anymore.

Valuation is becoming less about applying a multiple and more about understanding the underlying business, with a focus on true earnings quality, defensibility and efficiency.

Another significant but largely underappreciated upshot of the current environment is the emergence of roll-up opportunities.

The SaaS landscape is becoming increasingly fragmented

As valuations normalize and weaker players struggle to differentiate, the SaaS landscape is becoming increasingly fragmented. This creates fertile ground for consolidation strategies, particularly for investors with deep sector expertise.

Importantly too, AI enhances this model by enabling efficiencies across portfolios, from automated customer support to streamlined marketing and product development.

For investors, this is opening up a different kind of opportunity in terms of not just backing individual high-growth companies but participating in broader aggregation strategies that can unlock value through scale and operational improvement.

This means that purposefully positioning your business for ease of integration and standardization could pay dividends.

The short of it? Software isn’t going anywhere. Just like the major tech trends before it, it is simply evolving from a market that is less about hype and surface-level metrics to a more practical, mature model driven by genuine business outcomes.

For founders, this may mean navigating a more complex operating environment. But it also creates an exciting opportunity to differentiate.

Not all SaaS firms are primed for this new investment landscape, so those who pay due diligence by prioritizing intelligence over features, operational prowess and AI interoperability to deliver clear, measurable value will be best positioned to succeed.

We've reviewed and ranked the best business cloud storage.

This article was produced as part of TechRadar Pro Perspectives, our channel to feature the best and brightest minds in the technology industry today.

The views expressed here are those of the author and are not necessarily those of TechRadarPro or Future plc. If you are interested in contributing find out more here: https://www.techradar.com/pro/perspectives-how-to-submit

• Microsoft posted an ad promoting Copilot on social media
• It said that Copilot is the "button you can press to fix everything"
• This has elicited quite the outpouring of rage from some folks, and it's not a wise promo given the prevailing climate around AI and Windows 11

Microsoft is catching some flak once again over the topic of AI in Windows 11, following what might be regarded as an overzealous piece of marketing.

Windows Latest noticed that Microsoft's marketing department posted an image across its social media (Facebook, Instagram, and X) which promoted the dedicated Copilot button and the AI assistant it summons.

The text featured in the pic was: "Them: There's no button you can press to fix everything," followed by a reply as if in a conversation that read: "Me: Wanna bet?"

Predictably this has stirred up some controversy, with responses to Microsoft's little ad that range from accusing Copilot of being "AI slop" (or "Microslop") through to comments along the lines of "no one wants this" and similar negativity.

Undermining the fix Windows 11 effort

This is a particularly poorly timed piece of PR, given that, as Windows Latest observes, Microsoft is finally bringing in the ability to change the Copilot key back to function as Right Control. This is the key that the Copilot button replaced on 'AI PCs' (laptops), but as some people have said, Right Control is crucial to their workflow (and has accessibility ramifications for one-handed keyboard use).

With that change coming to Windows 11 later this year — an effective softening of Microsoft's initial stance that you should have the Copilot key and like it — this marketing snippet feels even more badly judged.

What's worse here for me is the exaggeration of the usefulness of the Copilot key. The AI can "fix everything" can it? It's a frankly ridiculous statement to make, and yes, I know that's not exactly uncommon in advertising, but you've got to bear in mind your target audience here and the context.

AI in Windows 11 has triggered a lot of bad feeling in the user base since last year, and indeed Microsoft's blinkered focus on pushing AI was one of the reasons that people were up in arms about fixing the OS rather than adding Copilot trimmings. Or in other words, the big fix Windows 11 campaign — which is the focus of this entire year for Microsoft — was partly the result of all the anti-AI feeling.

So, erm, let's market around the Copilot key being this amazing solve-all feature, shall we? Sounds like a great plan, everyone. Full steam ahead! Let's talk about how great it would be to add more AI into Notepad while we're at it, yeah? (Apologies, I remapped my Copilot key to be a 'Sarcasm' key and it appears to be jammed down right now).

Microsoft also says the Copilot key is a button with "main character energy" in this advert, the problem being that if AI in Windows 11 was a movie, it's been a box office turkey for the software giant so far. Microsoft's hope is that AI agents in Windows 11 will turn things around, but it remains to be seen how that'll pan out.

Meantime, while Microsoft is trying to generate positivity and good vibes around Windows 11 with all its (very commendable) work to fix the OS, it'd be better for the software engineers and designers in the thick of it not to have those efforts undermined by the marketing crew wheeling out unintentional ragebait like this Copilot button nonsense.

Now, I'm not saying that Microsoft's PR team can never mention AI, of course, but this particular snippet on social media is a perfect example of how not to do it in the current Windows 11 climate.

• Capture One has added native Hasselblad .3FR RAW file support
• Hasselblad's X2D II 100C, X2D 100C and CFV 100C are included
• Tethered capture is set to follow later this year

Hasselblad photographers, I have the news you've been waiting years for: Hasselblad cameras finally have native Capture One support.

The support covers Hasselblad's 16-bit .3FR RAW files and includes three of its 100MP medium-format cameras: the X2D II 100C, X2D 100C and CFV 100C digital back (which is the sensor module for the 907X). You'll need the latest version of Capture One 16.8.3 or Mobile Version 3.3.4.

It's truly a match made in heaven; Hasselblad's 16-bit RAW files and 'Natural Color Solution' render possibly the most true-to-life colors I've seen in my 15 years of testing cameras, while Capture One is industry-favorite editing software for color correction and tethered shooting.

This partnership between two Scandinavian companies had to happen some time, and now it has, with tethered shooting support (a studio setup where you can control the camera through the software) also promised for later this year.

It's a big deal for both parties — Hasselblad shooters can ditch Adobe, which is held in lower regard among pro colorists, in favor of Capture One and its precise photo-editing toolset.

The move might also attract new professional and commercial photographers, who have previously been put off because of the lack of Capture One support, to Hasselblad's medium-format digital cameras.

As for Capture One, it can potentially attract a new wave of existing Hasselblad photographers, with a seamless workflow from capture to the finished image.

Letting Hasselblad cameras sing

Until now, workarounds were needed to bring Hasselblad RAW files into Capture One, at the cost of color accuracy and editing latitude. Meanwhile, Adobe's photo-editing platforms, such as Lightroom, are held in less regard than Capture One for outright color fidelity.

Now Hasselblad's 100MP medium-format RAW files are supported, with profiles for Hasselblad's entire range of XCD lenses and the ability to organize files as well as edit them and, later this year, tethered capture.

I reached out to Hasselblad for comment, and a spokesperson told me: "One of the most consistent requests has been native support for Hasselblad RAW files in Capture One. This partnership is a direct response to that feedback, and we've been working with the Capture One team for some time to make it happen."

Capture One echoed Hasselblad's sentiment about the new partnership, saying "Giving Hasselblad photographers the native Capture One workflow they've asked us for is genuinely rewarding. Both of us are firmly rooted in the commercial and professional space, and that's a big part of why this partnership makes sense."

And when I asked about the challenges in bringing native support to a new format, Capture One told me, "The real challenge was less about simply reading the files. Getting a new format right means dedicated color profiles for each of the three cameras, so Hasselblad's files render with the true-to-life color our users know Capture One for, plus lens profiles for the XCD lenses that correct distortion, chromatic aberration, and light falloff.

"Throughout, the priority was making sure the unique character of these cameras comes through with the image quality we pride ourselves on."

You can sign up for a free Capture One 7-day trial if you've yet to try it, with subscriptions starting at $18 / £16.67 AU$27 per month, or a one-time purchase costing $349 / £336 / AU$523.

• Some Windows 11 users have found their drive space has been mysteriously dwindling
• In some reported cases, this is down to a database file for a Windows component that grows massively due to an apparent bug
• The optional update for June fixes this, albeit that patch is still in testing

If you use Windows 11 and have been wondering why your drive space seems to have been mysteriously dwindling of late, the culprit could be a background process called Capability Access Manager.

Capability Access Manager (CAM) is a rather obscure Windows component which, as the name suggests, manages the apps on your PC in terms of permissions to access the camera, mic and so forth.

CAM keeps a database that logs app requests and this is stored as a file called CapabilityAccessManager.db-wal – and it's that file which is growing hugely on the drives of some unlucky Windows 11 users.

Neowin reports that Microsoft just implemented the fix for this aggravating issue in the latest update for Windows 11. This is patch KB5095093 which is the optional update for June (so it's still in preview, or testing, at this point).

In the changelog for this release, Microsoft tells us: "This update improves disk space usage for the CapabilityAccessManager.db-wal file."

So, with any luck, this will be an end to the gremlin, and those who install the June preview will find this database file has been changed so it doesn't spiral out of control and eat their storage like some kind of log-based black hole.

Analysis: a baffling case of bloat

This is a nasty little problem, especially for those who've got a modest main drive for Windows 11, such as a 256GB SSD (or maybe even smaller). With reports of the database file expanding to a size of 60GB to 100GB, or even larger (200GB according to this Redditor), you can see how problematic this could be when you're already short on space with your SSD.

Microsoft doesn't explicitly say that this is a bug, but surely it must have been? Albeit a situational one that only occurred on certain systems by all accounts (Dell PCs are mentioned in a few reports, I should note). It's clear, however, that there are a lot of reports of CAM woes on Reddit and Microsoft's own help site, with some folks left scratching their heads as to what on earth was going on – and why their drive space was disappearing into some apparent void.

Unfortunately, these problems have been around for some time, with those reports going back to March 2026, and some dating from almost a year ago. As one Redditor explained in a post some 10 months ago: "Turns out it's the 'CapabilityAccessManager.db-wal' file which ate up 25GB. Looked through some forums and seems like it's a notorious culprit for system bloat. That file is supposed to slowly build up then be emptied each month, but mine bugged and never emptied itself."

There are workarounds to delete the CAM database file and effectively empty it out, but they're somewhat fiddly, and the log will rebuild itself if buggy conditions still abound on your PC. As one Redditor observed: "I spent hours trying to delete that file. Like in a horror movie, it just wouldn't die, even when I thought I had killed it. Your procedure [workaround] worked perfectly. Thanks!"

So, the whole thing has been a bit of a headache really, and while it's good to see an apparent cure now, it's taken Microsoft long enough. And frankly, I'm not impressed with the communication on this issue from the software giant.

To be clear, the fix right now is to download and install the June optional update for Windows 11, but bear in mind that as noted, it's a preview, so there's no guarantee it'll work as it should. The resolution will be provided with the full July update, mind, in tested form, and that's just around the corner – so you might just want to wait for that. Assuming your drive isn't chock-full and causing you a whole load of grief, anyway.

• Conversation focus is being limited to three hours a month for some Meta glasses users
• For a longer 15 hours a month limit you'll need to pay for Meta One Premium
• The feature is handled on device, so it's unclear why it has been paywalled

The Meta Ray-Bans and other AI glasses can perform a slew of useful tasks thanks to their wearable hardware and digital assistant — but Meta has just announced that one of those features will be getting serious limitations as it introduces a paid subscription plan that will unlock more usage time.

Conversation focus was showcased at Meta Connect last year, and is essentially an audio mixer for your real-life conversations. When you switch the feature on — using the voice command "Hey Meta, start conversation focus" — the specs’ microphones will pick up the voice of the person you’re looking at, the AI will separate their voice from the background noise, and then your glasses’ speakers will play what they’re saying to you to amplify their speech and make it stand out.

It’s an impressive feature, and very useful if you struggle to hear people in crowded spaces — or are starting to become a little hard of hearing and want a voice boost much of the time — but this is the feature Meta is now starting to limit. If you only have the free account that you create when you set up your glasses in the Meta AI app, you’ll just have three hours of conversation focus a month (as spotted by The Verge).

If you want more hours you’ll need to sign up to a paid Meta One Premium subscription, which costs $19.99 per month. Notably this subscription doesn’t unlock unlimited conversation focus access; instead your limit is bumped up to 15 hours a month.

In addition to this, Meta One Premium will also give you access to more advanced Meta AI reasoning models through the app, and expanded access to image and video generation models.

Was this inevitable?

We know that unlimited free AI access isn’t sustainable. Every AI query has a data center and energy cost to AI companies like Meta, and eventually they'll need to recuperate those costs or risk serious financial struggles.

However, no matter how inevitable a Meta AI glasses subscription seemed, this isn’t how I imagined it would roll out — frankly it’s quite a bad look for Meta, and I hope it reverses course.

My frustrations with this change as a Meta AI glasses user are three-fold. First, having something that was previously free taken away is never fun, especially as features like conversation focus felt like they’d already been paid for via the purchase of Meta’s glasses.

If Meta One had instead locked a new more powerful AI model behind a subscription, or some powerful new tool, that would feel very different. Your glasses would still do everything you were told they could do at launch, but to get some serious upgrades you’d need to pay up — sure this wouldn’t feel all that amazing either, but at least Meta wouldn’t be seen to be taking a feature away and holding it hostage.

My next frustration is that it’s conversation focus specifically that is being taken away. As I've mentioned, this is something of an accessibility tool, and while I’m sure most users only activate it periodically if there’re in a very noisy bar or somewhere similarly packed, for some I can see conversation focus being a tool they rely on frequently if they have more general hearing troubles but aren’t quite ready for a more sophisticated aid.

The flip side, unfortunately, is that if conversation focus isn’t a tool everyone uses all the time it’s the one least likely to actually inconvenience most Meta glasses users, allowing the company to experiment with paid access to tools without upsetting a large section of their consumer base.

Finally, according to Meta itself, conversation focus is handled entirely on-device. Your Meta AI glasses can offer the function without an internet connection, meaning it shouldn’t be costing its data centers anything to process.

In a way, taking unlimited conversation focus usage away is like Meta limiting how many photos your glasses can take a month. All the hardware and software tech is on your device; it’s just being locked away in what seems like a classic case of corporate greed.

Now, the silver lining at the moment is that if you haven’t noticed any rate limits yet, or heard about Meta One through your specs, it’s likely that your glasses are still working the same as they always have. As explained in the help article, “Meta One is currently in limited testing and isn't available everywhere yet.”

Additionally, I’m hoping the fact that Meta One is still in testing means Meta won’t be afraid to reverse course, especially as this decision feels so nonsensical for all the reasons I’ve outlined. Or perhaps it’ll be forced to rethink things if its AI glasses rivals (including the incoming Android XR specs) boast similar features at a similar price with no such paywall or usage limit.

Otherwise, this feels like yet another unforced error for Meta in the smart glasses space. How can we now trust tha tMeta won’t paywall any AI glasses feature we’ve previously had access to?

Following the announcement of its more budget-friendly AI glasses — including a pair styled by Kylie Jenner — I hoped it might be getting back on the right track. This latest announcement has knocked my confidence, but the ball is still in Meta’s court — perhaps Meta Connect 2026 will see it properly turn things around.

• Windows Subsystem for Linux gets new container feature after being teased last month
• CLI and API form the basis of the latest update, Intune management also added
• Other changes being made available to alternative container CLI tools

Microsoft has released Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) containers in public preview following its earlier announcement at Build 2026, as a way to create, run and manage Linux containers directly on Windows.

When the feature update was first revealed, Microsoft described it as "a built-in way to create, run and interact with Linux containers using familiar CLI & API."

The new container feature is now available in the latest pre-release version, which can be downloaded from GitHub, and includes two new core features.

WSL containers now available in public preview

As part of the update, Microsoft has added a built-in container CLI and an API to let Windows applications run Linux containers.

The company noted that the API is particularly useful for reusing existing Linux specific code, like running cloud applications locally, while the CLI tool uses a familiar format so users can "use [their] existing muscle memory when running Linux containers."

Microsoft also added new management settings to let admins control whether people can use WSL distros and containers via Intune.

Besides the headlining container update, Principal Product Manager Craig Loewen also highlighted a series of other changes the company has made to WSL, including a new 'virtiofs' file system that makes Windows file access 2x faster and a new 'consomme' default networking mode to improve compatibility.

Loewen noted that the lower level platform changes are also being made available across "other fantastic Linux container CLI tools" like Docker Desktop, Podman Desktop and Rancher Desktop.

Microsoft has also published a support page covering how to install the API, which includes support for C, C++ and C#.

The company hasn't yet provided a timeline for general availability.

• An ex-Microsoft software engineer has created a lightweight alternative to Notepad
• TinyRetroPad turns back the clock to avoid the bloat Microsoft has introduced to the text editor
• The engineer observes that the app has no bloat or telemetry, and that it's "just pure old school Windows done right"

Ever long for the days when Notepad was a lean, mean, text editing machine? If so, a software engineer who used to work at Microsoft has just released something you may well be interested in.

The Register noticed that Dave Plummer — who was likely one of admittedly many catalysts that sparked Microsoft's fix Windows 11 campaign — has created TinyRetroPad. (It's a fork of Dave's Tiny Editor or DTE by Matt Power, which, in turn, was built on the foundation of Plummer's HelloAssembly — the world's "smallest possible complete Windows application" no less).

TinyRetroPad is a fully functional text editor in the style of the original Notepad, completely streamlined and with all the bloat removed, so it's, well, tiny as the name suggests, weighing in at 2.5KB.

Plummer explains that he isn't keen on Notepad as it is, and so he "rebuilt it from scratch", with: "No bloat. No telemetry. No nonsense. Just pure old school Windows done right."

Analysis: note to Microsoft – debloat Notepad

In case you weren't aware, Notepad has been accused of being a bloated application for quite some time now, as Microsoft has expanded its features to cover all kinds of bases beyond what you'd expect from what's supposed to be a basic text editor.

Of course, the problem is that WordPad — which used to be the app that covered the middle-ground between Notepad and Microsoft's fully-fledged Word — was ditched back in 2024. Since then, Microsoft has drafted more and more features into Notepad in what's essentially covering for the removal of WordPad.

The trouble is that this is very much at odds with Notepad's core philosophy of being a lightweight text editor, and Windows 11 users now fear it's being bloated and will eventually end up less and less responsive, and therefore less useful as a quick-and-easy editor that puts a premium on convenience.

What all this means is that some people have abandoned Notepad and searched out third-party alternatives for Windows 11. Of course, TinyRetroPad represents another of these offerings, albeit about as pure and compact an alternative as you'll find.

How is this app so very small? Essentially, the program can be extremely compact because it taps components already installed in Windows.

As Plummer explains: "TinyRetroPad is basically a wrapper around the RICHEDIT50W control from the WinAPI."

So, Plummer notes, if you want Notepad to be "exactly like you might remember" from the Windows XP era, this is what TinyRetroPad does. I think the ex-Microsoft engineer may have a few takers on his hands.

• AI is forcing Apple to deliver security updates more often
• iOS 26.5.2 is part of Apple's new update strategy
• More updates mean better protection against AI-powered cyberattacks

It seems that the number of ways AI is changing the world is increasing. The requirement for more RAM to run new AI features in Apple products is already being blamed for the recent price increase in Apple products, as well as for the current high price of RAM itself.

Now, according to a recent Reuters report, AI is also to blame for the number of iOS and macOS updates we'll need to install. The bad news is that it's going up, all because of the threat posed by the latest AI models and their potential to aid cyberattacks.

Instead of waiting for the next scheduled operating system update for the latest round of security fixes to arrive, Apple is now delivering individual security updates ahead of the next iOS and macOS 26.6 update.

iOS 26.5.2 is here now

If you look in Settings > General > Software Update on your iPhone, you'll see that iOS 26.5.2 is waiting for you now, unless your iPhone already installed it overnight.

The description for the update reads, rather vaguely: "This update provides security fixes for your iPhone," but it's the dangers posed by AI that are driving this update, so make sure you install it promptly.

Details of the security updates for all Apple operating systems are available on the Apple Security Updates page.

Malicious hacking tools

The Reuters article states that the urgency of the update is due to the risk that AI now poses to Apple devices.

"The company told Reuters on Monday it was adapting to the reality that, given the ability of artificial intelligence to speed the development of malicious hacking tools, it needed to reduce the time between when updates were first made public and when they were put into customers' hands."

It looks increasingly likely that this will become the new normal for security updates, and companies like Apple won't be able to rely on bundling the latest security fixes into the next scheduled operating system update. Stand-alone security patches delivered whenever they're needed are something we're all going to have to get used to.

While it might be annoying to keep updating our tech gadgets more often, it's a small price to pay for better security in the AI era. We'll just have to get used to software updates being less about new features and more about staying ahead of increasingly sophisticated cyberattacks.

OpenAI and Anthropic are publicly disagreeing about whether their new AI cyber tools should be shared with European regulators.

OpenAI has offered Brussels access to its model. Anthropic is holding back, with Commission talks described as being at a different stage. Both have framed their position as the responsible one, and both arguments have merit.

But whether openness or restriction is the right call is ultimately a policy question and one that will take time to resolve. For organizations managing cyber risk today, the more immediate question is whether the teams are equipped to handle what these tools can already do.

AI systems can now autonomously carry out multi-step cyberattack tasks in controlled environments. Anthropic's Mythos completed a 32-step simulated corporate attack in testing.

Before it existed, no AI had ever done that in this type of full-chain simulation. Regulatory access to that kind of model matters for policy development. But the organizations that will be on the receiving end of attacks it enables are not waiting for that process to conclude.

The question of who decides when a powerful cyber tool is safe to deploy is important. But responsible deployment cannot just mean responsible release. It also means ensuring the organizations expected to defend against these capabilities actually have the people and skills to do so.

Most organizations are underprepared

Recent UK survey data found that only 27% of UK organizations are fully prepared for AI-powered attacks. Seven in ten are operating with partial or no AI-specific readiness, even though the vast majority of senior leaders already recognize that AI is increasing their risk. The awareness is there. The preparation is not keeping pace with it.

Part of the issue is that cyber security has long been treated as a technical problem with a technical solution. Buy the right tools, run the right software and you are covered. AI fundamentally changes that assumption.

When attack tools can learn, adapt and probe defenses continuously, finding weaknesses, failing and trying again without getting tired, the humans on the other side need to be able to keep up. That requires expertise, not just familiarity with a dashboard.

The skills gap is an operational risk

AI identifying a vulnerability is only the first part of the problem. Someone still needs to understand what they are looking at, assess how serious it is, prioritize it against everything else on their plate and act quickly. That judgement does not come from a tool.

It comes from trained, experienced people who have built that capability over time. This is especially important as AI-generated attacks become harder to distinguish from legitimate activity. Threat recognition at speed requires pattern-matching built through experience and training, not simply access to the right software.

The data supports this. Among organizations that have invested in ongoing certification training, 86% report a measurable reduction in cyber risk, with an average reduction of nearly 48%. Certified teams also recover faster when something goes wrong.

Nearly half of UK organizations surveyed experienced at least one attack in the past 12 months, with the financial cost most commonly landing between £100,000 and £199,999 once recovery, downtime, regulatory fines and reputational damage are factored in.

Regulation is moving, but slowly

This is also where the governance question gets more practical. Giving regulators access to frontier AI models is useful for understanding what they are dealing with. But that access is only meaningful if the organizations it is meant to protect have the capability to act on what those models can do. A policy framework built around tools most security teams are not yet equipped to respond to does not close the gap.

AI security standards are still being written. Most security teams have limited awareness of what frameworks even exist, let alone what is coming. The EU AI Act, NIS2 (Network and Information Security Directive 2) and emerging sector-specific guidance are all moving targets. Organizations that build continuous training into how they operate will be better placed to keep up as those requirements take shape.

The fix is known

For most organizations, the question of whether they have the skills in their people to respond when it matters is the gap between awareness of risk and readiness to manage it.

The investment in trained and certified security professionals has a measurable impact on an organization's ability to deal with attacks. It also builds the kind of internal capability that makes it easier to maintain regulatory compliance as requirements evolve. This isn’t a glamorous answer but the evidence for it is consistent.

Organizations that view training as a core part of managing cyber risk, rather than something to be revisited after a breach, are generally in a much better place. The tools and the threats will evolve all the time. It is the difference between resilience and vulnerability.

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This article was produced as part of TechRadar Pro Perspectives, our channel to feature the best and brightest minds in the technology industry today.

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• Windows 11's File Explorer is receiving major improvements via the latest preview update
• File Explorer should perform much faster, including mounting disk images
• The update is currently in the rollout process

Microsoft is still hard at work fixing pain points within Windows 11 for its users. While this case isn't focused on gaming improvements, it addresses an issue that should improve one of the operating system's fundamental aspects.

As reported by Windows Latest, Microsoft is rolling out File Explorer improvements with its latest preview update, KB5095093. The update includes much better speed and performance of the File Explorer and increased responsiveness when mounting disk images.

This is a long-awaited update for Windows 11 users, as File Explorer hasn't always been the most responsive or fastest, especially compared to macOS or SteamOS, both of which feature fairly responsive file managers.

It's also worth noting that PC hardware, specifically SSD speeds and storage space, can have an impact on loading times. Still, the onus has been on Microsoft to fix its Windows 11 File Explorer, which has been noticeably slow even with a high-speed SSD — so this update is very much necessary.

Perhaps the most important improvement being rolled out is better performance for mounting disk images, which was arguably the worst aspect of Windows 11's File Explorer. This would often result in a five-minute wait for the disk image to fully open, and that's frustrating, especially for users with high-speed hardware.

Windows Latest also highlights that the 'Properties' tab on a file will be seeing a visual overhaul, with a more modern look using WinUI 3, as opposed to the Windows 95-era UI.

It's great to see Microsoft address these issues, seemingly as a wider attempt to improve Windows 11's functionality and appearance due to consistent user complaints. For sure, there's still more to be desired in the game performance aspect, but Microsoft should get praise where it's due.

My only concern is a potential update that could undo all of the hard work, since Windows 11 updates are notorious for breaking functionality, whether that's via File Explorer or as far as GPU stability — which have previously impacted Nvidia GPU users.

For the past two years, the generative AI conversation has been dominated by one piece of hardware: the GPU.

GPUs supplied the parallel compute needed to train large language models, and their scarcity quickly became a proxy for AI readiness.

But that shorthand is now incomplete.

The next phase of enterprise AI will not be defined by accelerators alone.

It will be shaped by CPUs, memory bandwidth, cloud capacity, networking, and the workflow systems that allow AI to move from casual experimentation into daily business operations.

AI’s true economic impact will not come from model access; it will come from whether businesses can turn AI into reliable, cost-efficient operational capacity.

AI is Becoming an Infrastructure Problem

The first wave of generative AI adoption was largely experimental. Employees used standalone tools to draft emails, summarize documents, or write code. These ad-hoc use cases were useful, but they did not require companies to redesign how work actually gets done.

The next wave is different. As AI moves deeper into enterprise workflows, IT infrastructure requirements become exponentially more complex.

A customer service tool that drafts a response is simple. An AI system that reads account history, checks policy, updates a CRM, logs the interaction, and triggers a follow-up task is an entirely different beast. This system does not just need a powerful model; it requires compute orchestration, secure data access, software integrations, permissions, audit trails, and fallback logic.

This is where the GPU-centric view fails. While GPUs remain critical for heavy inference, CPUs coordinate how these workloads interact with databases, APIs, security layers, and operating systems. As a result, memory bandwidth, latency, and power availability are becoming the true strategic constraints.

The High Cost of Unstructured AI Usage

The early enterprise playbook was simple: give employees access to powerful tools and see what happens. While this accelerated learning, it also exposed a massive financial vulnerability. Individual, unstructured prompting is expensive, difficult to measure, and hard to tie to tangible business outcomes.

We are seeing a major corrective shift play out among tech giants. Microsoft recently began pulling back internal licenses for Anthropic's Claude Code—which was costing between $500 and $2,000 per engineer monthly due to high token consumption—and is forcing its Experiences and Devices division to transition to GitHub Copilot CLI ahead of its June 30 fiscal year-end.

Similarly, Uber completely exhausted its entire AI coding tools budget in just four months. The ride-hailing giant deployed Claude Code to roughly 5,000 engineers and aggressively stoked adoption using internal leaderboards. The experiment was incredibly effective—assisted systems generated nearly 70% of committed code—but token usage scaled faster than anyone anticipated, forcing Uber's leadership to publicly question the net ROI.

Consequently, the future of enterprise AI will move away from fragmented prompting toward a central intelligence model. Rather than thousands of disconnected interactions, companies will rely on shared intelligence layers—centralized systems that understand corporate data, apply consistent business rules, route tasks across applications, and track performance.

This model is inherently more efficient because the same intelligence is reused across workflows rather than recreated from scratch by individual users.

From Answers to Workflows

The most critical shift in enterprise tech is the transition from tools that answer questions to systems that perform work.

Traditional software is deterministic: a user clicks a button, and a system performs a known action. AI workflows are more dynamic. An agentic workflow can retrieve real-time data, reason through a multi-step process, interact with third-party software, and loop in a human for approval.

This puts immense pressure on the full technology stack. To unlock actual productivity gains, businesses need clean data infrastructure, disciplined governance, and robust integrations. Advanced models are useless if layered on top of fragmented, disconnected corporate systems.

Unprecedented Change Management and the "AI-Native" Workforce

As these agentic systems mature, the impact on global employment will trigger a corporate change management crisis on a scale never before seen. AI will fundamentally alter hiring patterns and role requirements long before it eliminates headcount at scale.

Historically, headcount was the default lever to scale capacity; more customers required more support staff. AI breaks that linear relationship. Instead of asking how many people are needed to handle an influx of volume, leaders will increasingly ask how much of a process can be handled by automated systems.

This environment will aggressively reward adaptability. Professionals who stay ahead of the technology curve, learn to design AI-enabled workflows, and manage systemic exceptions will disproportionately benefit.

Conversely, the risk of displacement is starkest for those relying purely on legacy industry experience. Traditional technical and managerial paradigms are being disrupted by a new cohort of AI-native developers, product managers, and team members. These professionals do not just use AI as an assistant; they build, manage, and think in terms of automated, model-driven systems.

Those who fail to transition from traditional operators to AI-native orchestrators risk being replaced by those who do.

AI Infrastructure is Economic Infrastructure

The broader economic impact of AI will be determined by how deeply it can be embedded into the core systems that run global businesses.

GPUs, CPUs, networking, and data centers form the physical foundation. Agent orchestration, security, and observability form the operational foundation. Together, they dictate whether AI remains a novelty or becomes a scalable business capability.

The GPU race was merely the opening chapter of the AI boom. The next chapter will be defined by the holistic compute, data, and workflow systems that allow AI to do real work at scale. That is the moment AI stops being a tool and truly becomes infrastructure.

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This article was produced as part of TechRadar Pro Perspectives, our channel to feature the best and brightest minds in the technology industry today.

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When Apple unveiled its upcoming software updates at WWDC 2026 on June 8, we didn't really get much on macOS 27 — aside from an animated skit about how the Golden Gate name was chosen. But having given the operating system a trial run, I can report that there is in fact a lot to look forward to.

It's worth emphasizing that installing the developer beta is risky: it's no exaggeration to say it can potentially brick your Mac, or at least some of its apps. Unless you're sure about this, you should wait for the public beta in July or the full release of the software sometime in the fall (for the northern hemisphere).

Just because I haven't come across any problems in my testing doesn't mean it'll be the same for you, but I can tell you that I'm impressed by what I've experienced so far. This is still very much a work in progress from Apple of course, so don't treat this as a review — features may come and go before it's pushed out to everyone.

As for compatibility, macOS 27 Golden Gate leaves Intel Macs behind. You'll only be able to install and run this if you're on an Apple Silicon machine. Here are my three favorite things about it so far.

1. It's smooth and fast

Apple has promised performance upgrades with macOS 27 — though it's been a little vague on the details — and while I haven't run any benchmarks, I'd say my MacBook has felt noticeably faster and snappier. Perhaps Apple is taking advantage of not having to take Intel chips into consideration any more.

Other users have noticed the speed increases too, and it seems that high performance tasks are particularly benefitting from this. Even though I don't do much beyond writing, web browsing, and photo editing, I've seen less in the way of lag and sluggishness than I did before, which bodes well.

These performance gains should hopefully translate into battery life improvements as well, though I haven't noticed any real change in terms of time between charges. Bear in mind that there are still months of development to go on macOS 27 Golden Gate, so it's likely to get better over time (this is still only the developer beta, after all).

2. Siri AI is a genuine upgrade

I have to mention Siri AI, which is now up and running on my MacBook. With a little bit of help from Google and Gemini, it feels like Siri is now genuinely useful on the desktop: answers are accurate and informed, relevant, and personalized to you.

One of the most helpful upgrades is the way that Visual Intelligence now works on macOS 27. You can highlight anything on screen (Shift+Cmd+Space is the shortcut you want), and then ask Siri something about it — and the assistant then uses clues about what's on screen and image recognition to serve up an answer.

It's the sort of feature that should've been in Apple Intelligence from the beginning, but at least it's here now. In addition, the dedicated Siri app and the integration with Spotlight works really well too, making the AI more accessible and more versatile.

3. The interface tweaks

There are numerous interface tweaks here that aren't major on their own, but which all add up to make a significant difference. Even something as simple as having an overflow button for menu bar icons is really effective — it means if you've got a lot of them, they won't start disappearing behind the notch.

The Liquid Glass slider has been given a lot of attention, and it works as advertised. You can find it in the Appearance section of System Settings, and I've moved it all the way to the right — it's as little transparency as possible for me, please. I'm actually hoping Apple gives us more control over this in the final release.

As we've written about before, the icons that were plastered all over app menus are gone as well, leaving behind an interface that suddenly seems more elegant and clean. This isn't a user interface revamp by any means, but it feels as though Apple's engineers have thought long and hard about what changes to make.

• Windows 10 is getting extended support through to October 2027
• That's an extra year on the original deadline, although Microsoft didn't formally announce the extension
• It gives those who were worrying about what to do next with their Windows 10 PC (especially if it wasn't compatible with Windows 11) some welcome room to breathe

Microsoft has given consumers another year of extended support for Windows 10 without any formal announcement of this move.

Windows Latest spotted that Microsoft changed its info on Windows 10's Extended Security Updates (ESU) scheme to indicate that support now runs through to next October.

The section about the deadline now reads: "Windows 10 support has ended. You can enroll in ESU any time until the program ends on October 12, 2027. If you're already enrolled, your coverage will automatically continue through that date — no action needed."

So, as noted, this means that if you're signed up for the ESU, you will continue to get updates not for another four months — as the original deadline for support ending was October 2026 — but for 16 months. It's still possible to sign up for the ESU program if you haven't yet done so, too.

Microsoft confirmed to Windows Latest that this isn't a mistake in the text, and the ESU does indeed now run for another year.

Analysis: a commendable move from Microsoft – but a jaded reaction

I still run Windows 10 on my main PC (Windows 11 is on my secondary PC), and I was about to fire up the upgrade most likely next month, or perhaps August — but soon, anyway. This gives me, and no doubt plenty of others, some extra breathing room. A lot of it, actually, which is very welcome.

I may still upgrade to Windows 11 this year, but given my procrastinatory ways, I might well wait until next year now. Especially seeing as Microsoft is busy fixing Windows 11 in all sorts of ways currently, so it kind of makes sense to wait until all that work is done anyway.

Clearly enough, this is a positive move for consumers, and I'm pleased to see it. I've argued before that a year of extended support wasn't enough — considering the hardware requirements rule out many PCs from upgrading to Windows 11 — and that Microsoft should give consumers a second year. (Especially given all the e-waste issues raised around Windows 10's end of the line in the past).

With that second year now confirmed, I'm rather surprised that Microsoft doesn't appear to have announced this anywhere, and just made the change to its website info quietly in the background.

Perhaps the idea is to keep it on the down-low, so as not to put off any imminent upgraders? At any rate, much of the reaction to this decision is pretty muted. One of the most upvoted comments on this Reddit thread is: "So are they finally admitting that Windows 11 isn't good enough almost 5 years later?"

You don't have to look far to find other jaded commentary like: "The moment the support expires I'll go with Linux."

Also, some folks have taken the line that it's not a surprise to see Microsoft extend support, and indeed that it always does this. And yes, that's true for businesses, where the company may support an outgoing Windows version for multiple years. But this isn't the case for consumers; remember Windows 10 is the first time Microsoft has ever offered extended support outside of the business world.

As a reminder, the support is free (as long as you're willing to sync your PC settings to OneDrive, which isn't that big a deal, at least not in my opinion), or you can pay $30. If you've already signed up, there's no extra charge for the second year, as you might hope.

As observed by a Redditor above, it's almost five years since Windows 11 was launched — and the OS was formally announced half a decade ago this week, in fact. I just wrote about that at length, and how I'm more optimistic about the future of Windows 11 at this point than I've ever been. Still, as mentioned, I won't be rushing to upgrade just yet on my primary computer, but I'll put the trigger on that update eventually.

• Only 31% of companies say they have accurate AI software visibility – 36% for overall IT visibility
• AI is complex to track because it's a layer that sits across existing categories
• IT leaders are also under pressure to prove AI ROI

New data revealed in Flexera's State of ITAM report has revealed that only 31% of companies have accurate visibility into their AI software – an area of IT spend that continues to grow as new use cases emerge and models develop.

This comes as nearly three in five (59%) reveal wasted AI spend has increased over the past year, with increasingly complex software stacks being blamed for an overall drop in visibility.

Flexera found that complete visibility across IT assets has fallen to 36% – only slightly ahead of AI visibility – thanks to complex and intertwined SaaS, public cloud and hybrid environments.

IT stack visibility is getting worse, not better

According to the report, ITAM professionals now spend more of their time optimizing software (32%), but audit response (22%) also takes up a considerable amount of their time.

As for AI, Flexera believes it's difficult to track because it doesn't occupy its own category. Instead, models, agents and platforms sit across multiple systems as an additional layer.

"What we’re seeing is a familiar pattern of rapid adoption followed by a scramble for visibility and control, as spend surges," Chief Product Officer Becky Trevino wrote.

But ironically, Flexera also found that AI promises to automate some ITAM work, including processing software contracts, purchase orders, licences and renewals.

With IT professionals under more pressure to prove AI ROI, the next steps move beyond identifying which AI tools are being used to consider how they're being used, how much they cost and what data they access.

Can you believe that it's now half a decade since Windows 11 was revealed? The operating system was first announced by Microsoft at a press event on June 24 back in 2021 (although the OS was leaked just before that, in typical fashion).

Five years ago today we were told that Windows 11 was inbound as a free upgrade for all Windows 10 users — but there was no stampede to adopt it, that's for sure (and the hardware requirements certainly didn't help the cause).

It wasn't until July 2025 that Windows 11 overtook Windows 10 as the dominant version of Microsoft's desktop OS according to Statcounter's figures, but it now holds a comfortable majority of over 70% of that market. As it should do, considering Windows 10 ran out of support last October (and only has a few months of extended support left).

However, putting aside the sluggish pace of adoption and the various problems that have plagued Windows 11 through the years (all the bugs and some notably missing features in the main), I think there's now cause for optimism for the future of Microsoft's operating system.

So, let me share my thoughts and reflect on what has been a half-decade of Windows 11, and tell you why I'm way more positive about the OS than I was last year — and why I think that Microsoft is finally on track (with, of course, some inevitable caveats).

The great fix-athon

Most of my hopefulness about where Windows 11 is heading comes, of course, from the big campaign Microsoft kicked off in March 2026 to fix Windows 11. Since that announcement — which I would say is the biggest statement to have been made since the OS was first announced in 2021 — Microsoft has very much proven that it intends to tackle all sorts of shortcomings and pain points with the OS.

Taskbar repositioning? We've got it. A much greater level of Start menu customization? Check. Spam removed from Windows search? Yep. More control over Windows updates? Certainly, and in fact way more control than I'd have ever believed might happen, including the ability to put off an update indefinitely, should you wish, on Windows 11 Home.

In fact, Microsoft has hit many wish-list features that I never expected would come to Windows 11, and the extent of the crowd-pleasing measures so far is heartening. These are features that are actually being delivered already, too, they're not just promises.

Furthermore, Microsoft appears to be listening to feedback and requests more closely, and generally engaging more with the community online. There's even a new initiative consisting of a research panel where Microsoft will consult testers directly on how to change aspects of Windows 11.

This genuinely feels like a fresh direction for Microsoft, and a serious commitment to change Windows 11 for the better based on what the users themselves actually want.

A more thoughtful, cautious approach

The other key driver for optimism with Windows 11 is the way in which Microsoft is taking more care over how the operating system is developed and coded.

Not so long ago, matters were less organized and more chaotic. Cast your mind back to the introduction of Qualcomm's Snapdragon X (Arm-based) chips in Copilot+ PCs back in 2024, alongside which Microsoft brought in a new underlying platform for Windows 11 (complete with the tinkering required to support that Arm silicon). While nothing was ever officially admitted, this is a move that I believe could have at least contributed to the mess that was the 24H2 update, which was laden with a ton of (sometimes very annoying) bugs.

Whatever the case in terms of how those glitches came to be, things have changed a lot since then. Microsoft is now being a lot more cautious with its Arm and x86 strategy — Windows 11 is split into two development paths, with the 26H1 update for Arm devices, and the 26H2 update for traditional x86 PCs — and the company has switched to use a fresh approach for these annual updates.

Instead of big annual updates — the last of which was the problematic 24H2 — Microsoft is now deploying small 'enablement packages', essentially very minor bumps to a new version of Windows 11. The actual features, the meat of Windows 11 changes, are pushed out in monthly updates as and when they're ready — in sometimes quite tightly controlled, carefully paced rollouts. This more gradual drip-feed of features is a more reliable method of deployment compared to dropping a lot of stuff all at once.

In short, Microsoft has learned its lesson from the nightmarish 24H2 release, which suffered from far too many bugs, to take on a fresh new way of operating. True, there will still need to be big updates at times, when the underlying codebase of Windows 11 has to be changed (quite possibly with 27H2). But it looks like Microsoft wants to mainly stick to compact, easily applied annual updates in the main, with features pushed out elsewhere in general.

Optimism abounds — with a notable catch

Between the ardent push to fix Windows 11 and the better thought-out deployment of features and updates, Microsoft has come a long way, but as I mentioned before, there are caveats here.

It's worth mentioning that while the new system of continual feature deployments, rather than weighty annual feature drops, is commendable (in my opinion), the controlled rollouts of these various features have come in for some criticism. Mainly because they are so cautious in some cases that something like the Start menu revamp (the one from last year, I should clarify, not the current work) took ages for some Windows 11 users to get, and those folks found that rather frustrating.

Part of that caution is likely down to Microsoft's paranoia around bugs, and sadly, the truth is that there are still too many bugs in Windows 11, and some of them are disappointingly weird. And by disappointing, I mean odd things that just shouldn't be happening.

I only need glance back to last weekend for one such example where there was a glitch with the Recycle Bin whereby the delete confirmation dialog (when junking a file from the bin) showed the internal file name instead of the proper name. While this only applied to the dialog box — so it was hardly an important or dangerous glitch — it was confusing some people, and more to the point, this sort of thing shouldn't be happening in the release version of an operating system.

This kind of bizarre slip-up also leads to folks blaming AI for being involved in Windows 11 coding. And while there is absolutely no evidence for that, it's the very nature of the strange bug that means people will easily jump to these conclusions when Microsoft has previously admitted AI is used to quite an extent in programming its software.

Whatever's at fault, Microsoft still needs to have better processes in place to catch these kinds of glitches, and other more critical bugs which have turned up in Windows 11 this year.

One thing I've called for in the past is a commitment from Microsoft to confirm that it's addressing its quality assurance processes, and improving bug squashing, and this is a notably missing part of the fix Windows 11 campaign. A vital part, in fact, I'd argue, for better stability going forward which is one of the big overarching goals (alongside better performance, and those crowd-pleasing feature additions).

Still, all in all, I've got to underline that right now, I'm as optimistic about Windows 11 as I've ever been. If Microsoft can tackle the bug blot on the OS landscape, and keep on listening to users — and its new research panel of testers from the community — Windows 11 could be in great shape come next year.

• Meta unveils $299 / £269 / AU$599 smart glasses (Meta Glasses) designed with EssilorLuxottica
• They match Ray-Ban Meta AI glasses on virtually all features
• They add adjustable nose pieces, and a lot of design and color choices

"It’s pretty easy to make glasses that don’t look good, it turns out," chuckled Meta CTO and Head of Reality Labs, Andrew 'Boz' Bosworth, shortly after unveiling a bumper crop of new Meta eyeware, simply called Meta Glasses, all fashioned in collaboration with EssilorLuxottica.

Bosworth says the team argues over "every gram, every quarter of a millimeter" in an effort to bring ever lighter, ever more comfortable, and ever more fashionable AI eyewear to the market. With this foray into making frames with a slightly less well-known brand than Ray-Ban, Meta is bringing the new frames — Adventurer, Fury, and Starfire Kylie [Jenner] Edition — to market at a somewhat startling price: $299 /£269 / AU$599 (not counting prescriptions).

No one size or style fits all when it comes to eyewear, Ankit Brahmbhatt, Meta's Senior Director of Product for AI glasses, told me as he walked me through some of the new frames. There are, he added, eight colorways and 26 different style options.

Ogling the style choices

As I looked around the room in the Manhattan event space, I spotted black, something like ivory, tortoiseshell, deep black, green, and a dark maroon. The frames range from larger and almost boxy-looking to thinner and lighter frames. In fact, many of the EssilorLuxottica frames are so relatively thin and light that you might miss the cameras hidden in the front, and the slightly thicker stems to accommodate components and batteries, and mistake them for normal frames.

Kylie Jenner's cat-eye-style frames are particularly fetching, and surprisingly looked halfway decent on me.

Brahmbhatt told me Meta worked closely with Jenner to develop the design, adding signature touches like a tiny gem in the frame, a mirror in the case, and even Kylie Jenner's voice in the Meta AI.

There are structural changes new to the Essilor Luxottica frames. The nose piece adjusts with a push to three different positions, the stems are bendable at the ends (Bosworth noted that the wires are coated with a kind of cellulose plastic), and the stems actually flex outward. I tried on almost every style I could find, and they were all quite comfortable.

One of the biggest changes, though, is the addition of a small button behind the traditional Meta AI glasses button that you might use to capture a photo or start a video: it's a tiny Meta AI summoning button, and I used it interchangeably with saying, "Hey, Meta."

More and better AI

This is also the first set of Meta AI glasses to feature a Meta AI system backed by the company's more robust Muse Spark models, which provide a more conversational voice, better context awareness, and the ability to tap into the zeitgeist by checking out social media (at one point I asked Meta AI if there was chatter online about fake food, and it confirmed that many were talking about it on social media).

I tried the new Meta AI in a few scenarios, and it ably identified whatever I was looking at (I could hear it snap a picture before the analysis), launched a music playlist based on my surroundings, and translated Arabic print for me.

That all of this comes in for under $299 (Ray-Ban Meta frames start at $379), and without compromising on the 3K video-shooting quality, 12MP photos, microphones, array, or speakers, is remarkable; but these are still relatively early days in the wearable AI space.

Getting it right and making it safe

Design is "really important if you want people to wear them as daily driver glasses," said Meta Head of Industrial Design Peter Bristol, who joined Bosworth on stage and took some questions from reporters.

In perhaps a nod to how thick and oversized AI glasses can look, the pair talked about how they made subtle changes to the designs, slimming down the frames, or simply making them look thinner by, for instance, adding a chamfer along the top edge of the frames, near the brow.

A good design means less friction, which Bristol believes can help with AI adoption.

For Meta, the goal is to "reach every corner of the market," said Bosworth, but that approach does come with risks.

When asked about growing concerns about the privacy of these glasses (there have been reports of people wearing them to illegally photograph women and even tampering with the glasses to turn off the LED "I'm filming you" light), Bosworth acknowledged these issues, but reminded us that Meta had actually "pioneered putting LED on the glasses," and talked about the anti-tampering technology they put in Gen 2 Ray-Ban Meta AI glasses. But, he added, it's "a cat and mouse game."

As for what the future holds, I pointed out to Bosworth and Bristol that, while they now have a lot of styles, not everyone wears, or wants to wear glasses. What about smart contacts?

"Absolutely, that one’s top of mind for the design team," said Bristol, adding, "We are thinking and trying the other potential paths, but it’s a complicated space, so glasses is front and center for us.”

Bosworth agreed with the premise of my question, admitting that he’s not a glasses wearer, but is happy to wear Meta AI glasses “because they brought a lot of value — but I’m aware that I’m doing it.

"The design team is absolutely captivated by this question. What are the other ways that we can deliver this capability to people who don’t have glasses on?"

"You can take the MacBook back. I don’t have the patience to learn a new thing," said my wife as she slid the MacBook Neo back across the kitchen counter.

It was the unceremonious end to a two-week-long experiment in which I encouraged my wife, a decades-long Windows user, to give Apple a try, more specifically, the flavor of Apple found in a lovely, citrus MacBook Neo.

Look, I am no pusher. Ever since I started testing the $599 laptop, my wife had been eyeing it. She was becoming Mac curious. This had a lot to do with her creaky Microsoft Surface Pro 4, a decade-old system that would soon face the dreaded end of Windows 10 security updates (no TPM 2.0 on that old Surface Pro).

As a realtor, she kind of loved the old girl. It ably ran all of her Web-based business software, handled emails, basic art needs for whipping up new listing sheets, and social media materials. She also knew, however, that it was almost time for an upgrade. We both wondered if the affordable and mid-range-powered MacBook Neo could ably step in for the Surface Pro.

My wife even told me that, if she went with the MacBook Neo, Cirtus would not be her choice; the blush looked rather nice. Of course, Citrus is what I had on hand, so that's what she got.

I told her that, while different, macOS would not be completely foreign. Sure, it moved some things around, but my wife was no Luddite; she picked up new tech pretty well.

One thing about her, though, should have been a warning: she hates change.

Taking the macOS plunge

Simply buying her a MacBook Neo — even if there are some nifty Prime Day Deals right now — without knowing if she'd take to it made no sense, and since I'd been testing and using this on-and-off for months, we decided to set her up with it as if she'd bought the system brand new.

I reset the MacBook Neo. It's a $699 model with Touch ID and 512GB of storage, and I told her that this would likely be the one we would buy anyway since I wouldn't want her to run into storage issues.

Next, we sat side-by-side as I walked her through the setup. She took to this part quickly, though I realized that the placement of Touch ID on the power/sleep button was non-obvious. When I told her to register her finger to unlock the laptop, she stared at the system for a few seconds, clearly looking for something with a fingerprint symbol.

You're on your own

For the next couple of weeks, I would watch her slip the laptop into her work bag or use it at the dining room table. I did catch her occasionally trying to tap the screen, which was unsurprising. After all, she'd spent a decade with a touch-screen convertible. I'd ask her how it was going, and she'd give me a slightly less-than-enthusiastic "OK".

At work, she said she struggled to connect to the office printer and finally had a coworker step in and help her.

When she was at home, I showed her how to add her OneDrive account to access work files, a move that seemed to both confound and confuse her. The Windows system automatically integrates the drive. For the Mac, there's an app and then a few steps.

Even the benefits I found in adding a Mac to my Apple ecosystem were lost on her:
"Why do my iPhone notifications keep popping up on the MacBook? That's annoying."

I kept waiting for that moment, the epiphany that triggered, "Why didn't I make this switch years ago?"

It never came.

She found the need to use two fingers to enact right-click functions confusing and didn't seem all that thrilled with the trackpad.

It was clear she appreciated the MacBook Neo design, and yet, she told me, “It’s nice and sleek and all of that, but I could get a new PC that’s nice and sleek and all of that."

As we walked through a Best Buy looking at both MacBook Neo and a bunch of comparable Windows machines from Lenovo, HP, Dell, and Acer, it was clear that the MacBook Neo had not won her over.

After she returned the system, my wife told me that she just couldn't get used to all the differences. Why was the control center at the top? Why did the dock look like that? How could they not have a Start button?

For the average Mac user, like myself, there were all good reasons for these design elements and placements, but, having been a switcher myself, I understood the confusion. Working on a MacBook after 30 years on Windows means you are living in a constant state of "Who moved my cheese?" And when you, as my wife does, have important work to get done, you can't have a system's quirks getting in the way of your productivity.

Getting real

None of this is a commentary on the still excellent MacBook Neo, but it does say something about a certain class of users who, while Apple might try to attract them with the affordable MacBook Neo, are unlikely to make the switch.

The reality is that the best market for the MacBook Neo is still the back-to-school market, where it will likely have an easier time of swaying kids who've used Chromebooks or have only been on iPads.

They'll become Apple's newest customers. As for aging Windows users, getting them to make the switch might be more than Apple can or should hope for — even with the appealing MacBook Neo.

• Microsoft has confirmed that 26H2 will be a minor update
• It'll be a "small enablement package" like Windows 11 25H2
• This means less likelihood of bugs, with major features being rolled out separately in monthly updates – a sensible approach, although that said, 27H2 could be different

Microsoft has confirmed that Windows 11's next annual update will be another minor affair, all in the cause of avoiding a repeat of the chaos around the 24H2 update.

Windows 11 24H2 was the last version of the OS to land bristling with major changes, as 25H2 was a small incremental update – and now it's confirmed that this will be the case for 26H2 as well.

Windows Latest reports that Microsoft confirmed that Windows 11 26H2 is a "small enablement package" just like 25H2 before it.

In reality, this means that the upgrade is essentially a lightweight download with no meaningful feature additions – so isn't that disappointing?

In a word, no, because it's just indicative of how Microsoft has switched to a more sensible way of working in terms of yearly updates for Windows 11.

Analysis: a more stable way of working

Instead of unloading a whole raft of new features in the annual update, Microsoft is now deploying those features in stages throughout the year. And that strategy of drip-feeding important new features in different monthly updates – with the usual controlled rollouts, the pace of which varies depending on how cautious Microsoft is feeling about any given piece of functionality – is a better way of working overall.

Not only does it mean that we don't have to wait until the latter half of every year to receive major new changes for Windows 11, but we don't have a massive download and complicated installation to deal with when the H2 update arrives, too. On top of that, there's more chance of things going awry when a big annual update lands, as we saw with the 24H2 update, which suffered a whole load of annoying bugs – and I think Microsoft learned its lesson from this.

So, what's the point of the annual update now? Well, 26H2 provides another marker for support, extending your ability to get updates. Those still on Windows 11 24H2 should note that support runs out for this version in October 2026 – which is when 26H2 should roll out (or just before, perhaps in September) – so those on 24H2 will need to upgrade to 26H2.

That said, the other possibility with installing a newer version of Windows 11 that's an enablement package is that while it doesn't pack any new features as such, stepping up to the latest release such as 26H2 may trigger a feature rollout for your PC that you wouldn't have got otherwise. There's no guarantee you'll get anything, mind, but it could work out that way.

All in all, I'd rather Microsoft worked this way for the noted reasons around the increased stability of piecemeal feature deployment, rather than them arriving in one big lump with the inherent danger of a bunch of gremlins therein.

Microsoft can follow this path because the foundations of the underlying codebase remain the same – which has been the case since 24H2 – although at some point, it'll need to take Windows 11 forward onto a new codebase, which is when we'll see a bigger update.

And we've already had signs that this will happen with next year's update, and that 27H2 could represent a big change for Windows 11, one that unifies the Arm and AMD/Intel (x86) architectures (with the former currently split off into its own branch of the OS, on the 26H1 update instead of 26H2).

Hopefully going forward, Microsoft will still stick broadly to the new philosophy it appears to have embraced, in terms of fewer big updates and multiple enablement packages in-between.

Most companies don’t understand that today’s AI tools are capable of fundamentally transforming how daily knowledge work is done.

This is because they’re using AI in an unsophisticated way and aiming it at the wrong place.

But this level of transformation is already happening, as millions of knowledge workers have figured out, and as enlightened companies are starting to recognize.

To delve deeper, you first need to understand that most knowledge work is invisible. The essence of knowledge work—thinking, processing, judging, ruminating, planning, mulling—happens in workers’ heads, unseen.

Unfortunately, workplace AI is currently deployed into the knowledge systems that are visible, the outputs —emails, documents, chats, meetings, etc. It doesn’t matter how good the AI is, because when it operates at this level, it’s too late to really transform how the work is done.

To give a practical example, when you need to create a project deliverable, 80% of your effort is likely spent creating the first draft, with the remaining 20% polishing into a final deliverable. AI workplace assistants do a great job with that final polish (which we like, thank you). But to truly transform how work is done, you need AI to help with the underlying, unseen 80% effort used to create the first draft.

The real opportunity: A practical model for AI-driven work

The good news is AI is fully capable to help transform that 80%. This does not require waiting for “better” models or AGI. All you need to do is change how you’re using AI today, by integrating existing LLM-based tools into that invisible thinking portion of your work, rather than just keeping it at the surface-level work outputs.

While the AI vendors haven’t exactly made this intuitive (yet), using AI in this way has exploded in popularity since the beginning of 2026. In practice, the basic approach is to use AI the way software developers do, not as a one-off tool but as something that builds context over time.

Move beyond web-based interfaces where every conversation restarts from scratch

Create a centralized repository, put your critical files into a folder on the business computer which you give AI access to. Start with the classic things (deliverables, meeting notes, project plans, etc.)

Before doing any work, ask AI to interview you about your work style, what’s important to you and your personal preferences.

Review and refine AI’s understanding, ask it to scan through all your files to synthesize your latest thinking, ideas, story arcs, writing style and any other “intelligence” it can determine from your work. Review its findings and go back-and-forth until you feel it has a good understanding of you, your work and your style.

Build upon each session. A crucial step is having the AI tool understand this is not a one-time or manual exercise. Instead, a continued process to create, maintain, organize and update the files, based on what it learns about you over time, each subsequent AI session builds on all the work you’ve done together and what it has learned about you.

In essence, you are asking your AI to create a personal Wikipedia-style repository which gives your AI system an ever-growing continuous context library perfectly built and tuned just for you and your work.

Using AI like this doesn't require a new product or company, but a new way to leverage current tools. This is often called a “second brain”, “AI context vault”, “LLM-powered personal Wiki”, or something similar, and you can do this with any LLM vendor or product.

Most AI vendors now allow users to connect their LLM platforms into other business systems (like email, chat, document stores or productivity suites), which lets workers connect their personal knowledge systems into corporate apps and data.

Workers who use AI in this new way report fundamental shifts in the way they work within the first few hours. After a few days, many workers declare they will never go back to the “old way” of working again.

The tradeoffs to consider

Using AI to transform work in this way is not without its downsides, especially from the corporate perspective.

First, all the “classic” security complexities still apply: How do you know the AI did what it said it was going to do? How do you know it didn’t hallucinate? How do you trust it won’t spin out of control and email all your contacts with nonsense?

Addressing this involves many of the things you probably know but haven’t taken time to investigate yet, including configuring alternate accounts with restricted permissions for AI or setting clear guidelines for when and how AI-generated outputs will be reviewed.

This new process also requires asking workers to slow down and verify what their AI generates, which is pretty much the opposite of why they started using AI in the first place.

Another challenge is visibility. Much of the “back-and-forth” work - which previously happened in the open - now happens within the AI tool and the worker’s personal context vault, where it’s less visible to coworkers and management scrutiny. Individual workers view that as a positive, but to organizations, it can be a liability.

Lastly, when workers build personal AI context vaults using their personal AI subscriptions, the company can’t prevent the worker from taking all that context with them when they leave the company. Companies need to buy proper enterprise AI subscriptions which they can link to corporate SSO and DLP systems. The downside is that enterprise AI pricing is completely different from consumer pricing, and workers using AI like this via enterprise systems can easily consume thousands of dollars of tokens per month.

The bottom line is that today’s AI can fundamentally transform work, but only if there is a mindset reset around how it is being used.

This new approach introduces added complexity. Organizations will need to spend more time understanding, managing, and securing AI differently, but it’s clear that AI operating in this way is inevitable, so the time to start thinking about AI as a “second brain” is now.

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• A new Windows 11 bug has hit the Recycle Bin
• You may see the wrong file name displayed
• Microsoft says it's working on a fix

The latest frustrating bug to hit Windows 11 affects the trusty Recycle Bin, and it has apparently been delivered by the latest Patch Tuesday (update (KB5094126) — though Microsoft says it's aware of the issue and is working on a fix.

As Neowin reports, the bug means that when you try and delete a file from the Recycle Bin, the confirmation dialog shows the internal file name rather than the actual file name. It's not particularly serious, but it is confusing.

The proper name is shown in the Recycle Bin itself, and the proper name is used if you decide to restore the file rather than deleting it. The alternative internal name is only used on the confirmation dialog screen.

Microsoft says it's working on a fix for the issue, though we don't have a timeframe for when it'll be delivered. It's just one of several issues that have been introduced with this bug, including problems with OneDrive access.

Is AI to blame?

Microsoft confirms Recycle Bin glitch affecting all supported Windows versions — yes, even the trash needs debugging from r/technology

As you might imagine, users on Reddit have taken a rather dim view of the latest mishap from Microsoft. Many are suggesting that this is the result of code written by AI, though we don't have any confirmation of that.

Last year Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said that as much as 30% of the company's code was written by, and that number is probably higher now. As for how reliable and functional that code is, however, he didn't say.

"This update broke me, I'm so fed up with Win 11 and all the issues that at this very moment I’m installing Linux on my desktop," commented one user. "Bye Microslop!" The Reddit thread also includes reports of numerous other issues.

Bugs accompanying Windows 11 updates are pretty much par for the course at this stage, and Microsoft is often trying to deal with multiple reported issues at once — though it has also been making progress with some substantial upgrades in recent months.

Artificial intelligence has transformed enterprise cybersecurity into a machine-speed quickdraw contest.

Today, threat actors routinely use AI and automation to launch sophisticated, multi-stage campaigns that exploit gaps between disconnected security tools.

Once inside a network, modern attacks move laterally across cloud environments, endpoints, and applications within minutes.

Because defensive windows have shrunk from hours to seconds, security teams must rely on AI-driven analytics to correlate threat telemetry and trigger automated remediation before a breach spreads.

To achieve this coordination, many organizations are aggressively pursuing platform consolidation. The logic is simple: by replacing a fragmented patchwork of niche security vendors with a single, unified security platform, a Security Operations Centre (SOC) can centralize its data, simplify management, and orchestrate automated responses more fluidly.

The hidden risks of the single ecosystem

While consolidation can simplify things, it also changes an organization's risk profile. When multiple layers of cybersecurity are interconnected through a single vendor’s control plane, dependencies build up. This level of architectural reliance introduces severe systemic vulnerability.

If your monitoring tools, identity systems, and automated response mechanisms all live under one roof, a single point of failure can paralyze your entire enterprise. A major software flaw, a configuration error, a vendor cloud outage, or a supply chain compromise can trigger a cascading failure that knocks out multiple layers of defense simultaneously.

Furthermore, extensive centralization strips an organisation of its long-term architectural flexibility. Once integrated into a single ecosystem, switching providers or adapting to shifting regulatory and digital sovereignty requirements becomes a massive, cost-prohibitive operational hurdle.

The balanced solution: Hybrid AI architecture

Faced with these challenges, forward-thinking cybersecurity leaders are looking at a happy medium between inefficient platform fragmentation, and total consolidation by adopting a balanced, hybrid approach.

This strategy centralizes AI-driven analytics and detection where shared visibility adds the highest value, while deliberately maintaining strict independence in critical operational zones. A resilient hybrid architecture divides the security environment into two distinct operational mandates:

1. Centralized visibility and detection: Security teams should continue to feed telemetry from endpoints, networks, and cloud infrastructure into a centralized, AI-driven engine such as an advanced SIEM or XDR platform. This allows AI to analyze vast pools of data in real time, map attacker behaviors, and coordinate high-speed incident responses across the enterprise.

2. Isolated control layers: To prevent a total system collapse during a crisis, critical defense layers must remain insulated from the primary detection platform. Two pillars require absolute autonomy:

Identity and Access Management (IAM): Systems controlling user authentication and policy enforcement (like Okta or Active Directory) should not be deeply intertwined with the automated response platform. If an attacker compromises the automated security system, an isolated identity layer prevents them from gaining total, unhindered access to the entire enterprise kingdom.

Backup and Recovery Infrastructure: Disaster recovery tools lose their effectiveness if they rely on the exact same network infrastructure they are designed to restore. Maintaining independent, immutable, and air-gapped recovery layers ensures that even if a ransomware campaign or platform outage takes down the primary network, the business can safely restore operations from a position of absolute control.

Designing for survival

The reality of modern enterprise IT is inherently hybrid, spanning legacy systems, multi-cloud environments, and distributed global workforces. Attempting to force this sprawling complexity into a single security platform is impractical and not without risk.

As artificial intelligence continues to accelerate the threat landscape, the pressure to automate and simplify will only grow. Unified AI ecosystems are essential for operational speed, but true resilience requires architectural balance. Future security strategies will not be judged solely on how quickly they detect a threat, but on how effectively the business can maintain continuity during a catastrophic disruption.

By blending centralized AI intelligence with strategically separated control layers, enterprises achieve the ultimate defensive posture: machine-speed responsiveness without the risk of systemic collapse.

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• Illinois is set to ban smart glasses being used while driving
• The bill makes no distinction between glasses with and without displays
• Many online fear that it gives cops too much power to pull drivers over

Illinois is poised to be the first US state to ban smart glasses — of any kind — while you’re driving. Importantly, the bill makes no distinction between smart specs with a display and those without.

Once Governor JB Pritzker approves the bill, people caught flouting the rules could face fines of $75 (or $150 for repeat offenses) and the possibility of misdemeanor or felony charges if involved in a serious crash while wearing smart glasses.

Other states, such as New York, have proposed bills limiting smart glasses use while driving, but so far none have progressed as far as Illinois’ has — though that could soon change if states decide to take Illinois’ lead.

The hope is that this proposal will make roads safer by reducing distractions for drivers.

While there’s possibly some advantage of drivers having, say, navigation on a HUD in front of them to find their destination — which is something Amazon is hoping to offer its delivery drivers with its own smart glasses — attempting to text chat or watch a video on your glasses while driving is a terrible idea.

So, to discourage this kind of dangerous driving, it’s perhaps safer to just ban smart glasses and avoid any possibility of temptation.

Safer, but for who?

While many can agree that having a display distracting you while you drive isn’t ideal, some are questioning why non-display glasses — which are completely hands-free and boast zero visual distractions — are included in the ban.

Some have therefore wondered if there’s an ulterior motive to Illinois’ smart glasses approach, or if it’s at least not very well thought out.

Over on Reddit one user pointed out that the law “Gives cops license to pull over anyone and claim ‘oh, i thought those were smart glasses’” which could be abused by bad actors to write invalid tickets — with the user linking to a viral example of a cop using Florida’s existing driver laws to pull over a woman for texting while driving using a phone in her right hand, and doubling down even when the woman shows she doesn’t have a right hand.

Meanwhile, a commenter replying to Gizmodo’s coverage of this story said the rules have “Nothing to do with driver safety. Everything to do with law enforcement not wanting to be recorded,” as it’s much easier to record police with your smart glasses than holding up a phone.

On the flip side, Illinois does have precedent for banning audio distractions; headphones, earbuds, or other headsets that play audio into both ears are illegal under the state’s vehicle code. One-ear headsets are generally allowed, and there are exemptions for some professions and audio devices that improve hearing, like hearing aids.

Because audio can be a major distraction while driving — you might not hear sirens if you have active noise cancellation turned on, for example — even in places where it isn’t expressly against the law, it is advised against, and can work against you if you’re caught in an accident while immersed in your music.

Smart glasses don’t fully immerse you because they have open-ear audio, but their audio notifications and music playing into both of your ears could cause a distraction.

Additionally, because the tech is evolving so quickly, creating nuanced carve-outs today might lead to legal disputes or confusion down the line, especially as lawmakers aren’t known for being particularly tech-savvy. There’s a simplicity to just banning smart glasses outright while driving.

Of course, these rules are just for one state, assuming they get signed into law at all, but smart glasses regulation seems to be on the agenda for a growing number of local and national governments in an attempt to curb bad actors.

So don’t be surprised if similar rules start being proposed in your local area, and be sure to follow any new smart glasses rules that are introduced if you like using a pair.

• Windows 11's Xbox mode uses less RAM than the standard desktop, but doesn't improve game performance
• That's the conclusion based on a battery of tests by a popular YouTube channel
• Gaming performance on Valve's SteamOS is still better, while Microsoft is trying to catch up

Microsoft's push to improve gaming on Windows 11 is still an ongoing process, particularly with its Xbox mode that provides a console-style user interface — but is seemingly not doing much to boost game performance.

As highlighted by Notebookcheck, Windows 11's Xbox mode does result in decreased RAM usage compared to the standard desktop, but crucially it doesn't improve actual game performance — or that's the conclusion of recent testing by Linus Tech Tips (LTT).

When testing the likes of Forza Horizon 5 at 1080p with max graphics settings and no upscaling across two PCs with the same specifications, there was no difference in frame rates between the standard desktop and Xbox mode. The same was true at 1440p resolution, and with other games such as Cyberpunk 2077 and Doom: The Dark Ages, where LTT found either the same frame rates or a negligible difference.

It's important to note that both PCs in LTT's tests show memory usage at lower levels when using the Xbox mode compared to the standard desktop, but this made no impact on performance.

I should point out that this is just one set of benchmarks, and results will, of course, likely vary depending on the exact tests and system configurations involved. However, LTT's testing here is a strong enough indication of a disappointing overall performance for Windows 11's Xbox mode as it stands.

It's no secret that Valve's SteamOS offers better game performance than Windows 11, with more optimal RAM usage, and it doesn't feature any of the unwanted bloatware that Windows 11 is loaded with. While SteamOS does have its own desktop mode, it's a Linux distro that is built for gaming at heart.

Something is amiss with Xbox mode, it seems, and Microsoft is struggling with optimization here. On top of that, the Xbox mode rollout isn't fully complete, acting as another pain point for Windows 11 users looking for an easy console-like gaming experience.

Frankly, the longer it takes for all users to gain access to Xbox mode, and for performance improvements to be realized, the harder it'll be for Microsoft to catch up with Valve.

While Windows remains by far the dominant OS for PC gamers, if anti-cheat support on Linux improves, that'll spell big trouble for Microsoft with more users likely migrating to SteamOS.

By now, almost every enterprise has an AI story.

Years into the AI boom, disappointment has become a familiar refrain.

Only 28% of enterprise AI projects meet ROI expectations, with more than 90% of AI pilots never making it into production.

AI projects stall, returns fail to materialize, and executives quietly conclude that the technology “wasn’t ready”.

That narrative is convenient, but often wrong. So, where does ROI come from?

The problem with half-hearted AI

Most AI failures come from businesses unwilling to change how they work. Many organizations fund pilots, rally up innovation teams and deploy smart tools, but stop short of changing the systems those tools need to operate within.

Teams are given access to AI without being upskilled to use it effectively, and processes designed for human-speed decision making are left untouched, even as machine-speed systems are layered on top.

The disappointment soon follows... isolated productivity wins, no enterprise-level impact and increased skepticism from the boardroom. And yet, walking away from AI isn’t the answer either.

Businesses lose up to 30% of revenue annually due to inefficiencies, precisely the kind of structural waste AI is designed to eliminate. The European Parliament has even explicitly warned that underuse of AI tools could cost the EU its competitive edge and stall economic growth, with estimates showing AI could add up to $4.4 trillion annually to the global economy.

For organizations sitting on the fence, failing to innovate means falling behind, while competitors see compounding gains quarter by quarter as they’ve simply cracked the AI code.

Why the ROI gap is self-inflicted

The real cost, then, isn’t failed pilots, it’s half commitment. Many organizations treat AI as optional or experimental, then act surprised when it behaves that way.

The first step is to stop measuring AI like another IT project; measure it like R&D. Applying traditional ROI metrics to AI repeats the same mistake organizations have made during every major technology shift; expecting immediate returns from AI reflects industrial era thinking applied to a cognitive era transformation.

When email arrived, companies didn’t abandon it because quarterly earnings didn’t spike. AI is similar. The problem isn’t that it doesn’t work, it’s that it’s being evaluated with the wrong lens. CTOs and CFOs should treat AI budgets strategically, similar to how R&D investment may be considered.

While there are some short term savings, the real value lies behind the longer amortization windows, staged milestones and tolerance for early phase losses. This reframes boardroom conversations away from short-term justification and towards strategic capability building.

How can we fix this?

1. Learn from our failure

We encountered this issue firsthand. When we started integrating AI into our own delivery model, productivity pockets appeared, but there was no sustained internal buy-in and no systemic change to support those gains.

What worked was a deliberate, process-led shift. Rather than trying to scale everything at once, we focused on a small set of lighthouse projects backed by lean, cross-functional teams. AI was embedded across the full software delivery lifecycle, with attention moving away from tools and towards how work actually flowed.

The friction was never in the code, but in the systems around the code. How do approval chains work when compliance teams operate on weekly cycles, but AI agents move at machine-speed? How do organizations build reusable, secure components rather than rebuilding from scratch on every project?

Treating AI as part of the operating model, not a collection of tools, is where meaningful ROI starts to emerge. We're now applying the same model with clients, with faster shipping and fewer people.

2. Get ready to dig deep and change your foundations

One of the biggest reasons AI initiatives stall is because organizations simply layer new intelligence on top of operating models that were designed for a very different era. Many enterprises are still structured around legacy systems and linear approval chains built to standardize transactions, not to support real-time judgement.

AI needs context, access across systems and the ability to act. But in many organizations, data is locked inside heavily-customized ERPs, workflows are fragmented by function, and decision rights are buried in handoffs and committees. So before buying the shiny new tool, go back to basics. Fix the foundations.

The sharpest lever is decision rights. AI agents operate in seconds, but most enterprise decisions still route through weekly approval cycles. Until that gap closes, AI speed has nowhere to go. This also means confronting legacy estates honestly.

Not every core system needs to be replaced, but the processes and assumptions built around them may need to change if AI is to operate effectively.

Addressing structural foundations

This is uncomfortable work, but once the structural foundations are addressed - clearer decision rights, less fragmented data, outcomes-oriented teams - AI can dramatically compress the time it takes to rebuild.

This is where AI-native engineering pays off, as it allows businesses to go from treating AI as a feature, to building systems, workflows and organizations where AI is a first-class participant in how work gets done.

Instead of hard-coded logic and rigid process flows, AI native engineering centers on systems that are context-aware, continuously learning and capable of taking bounded action across the stack - from interpreting intent, to orchestrating workflows, to generating and improving code and decisions, in real time.

The competitive advantage comes not from access to better models, which are increasingly commoditized, but from how effectively an organization can embed those models into its operating fabric.

3. Build a portfolio dashboard, not project scorecards

Boards can’t evaluate AI as a portfolio if every initiative reports success differently. A standardized AI ROI framework, tracking utilization, business outcomes and strategic value, allows cross-initiative comparison and portfolio-level decisions.

It’s also important to manage expectations. Most organizations achieve satisfactory ROI on a typical AI use case within two to four years - far longer than the seven-to-twelve-month payback typically expected from traditional tech investments.

That said, where organizations align process, people and governance early, faster transitions are possible – especially with AI native engineering.

4. Put your whole heart into it

AI’s ROI problem is organizational, and leaders serious about this should be prepared to change how their company is set up.

AI doesn't fit existing structures and companies have to change to use it..

The cost of failure is real, but the cost of half-heartedness is higher, and far easier to overlook.

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• Microsoft is changing the way that Windows 11 updates are delivered
• The likes of .NET, driver or firmware updates will be bundled together with the monthly update
• This change is now in testing, alongside a lot of work to make Windows 11's default apps better

Windows 11 is getting some more very useful changes, including an improved process for updates and a raft of tweaks for the default apps in the OS.

Microsoft has just released a new preview in the Experimental channel (build 26300.8687) which packs the changes for Windows Update (which were announced as incoming a while back in April).

Microsoft tells us: "We are rolling out a new unified update experience to reduce the number of reboots you see per month. We are starting by coordinating driver, .NET, and firmware updates to align with the monthly quality update, reducing the update experience to a single monthly restart."

Elsewhere, Thurrott.com points out that Microsoft has a whole lot of work underway for the various core Windows 11 apps, and that the company is now documenting these changes under separate release notes for apps in its Learn portal.

Calculator is getting tweaked so it has readable text when using high contrast themes and more accurate square-root results (with rare errors fixed).

Windows 11's Camera app now supports more video resolution options, and a full range of zoom levels (plus the zoom slider now works with more cameras, including the latest models). Microsoft has also ensured that the front-facing cameras on more devices are supported.

The Clock has the ability to run more countdowns (up to three simultaneously) and a new 15-minute snooze on alarms, among a whole load of minor changes.

Microsoft Paint now offers functionality to adjust how transparent the eraser is, and the AI image panel has been tidied up with a cleaner layout. The toolbar loads faster, too, and a bunch of stability tweaks have been applied, reducing the likelihood of crashes.

The Photos app also has some useful changes so it'll now display very tiny images (such as pixel art) with an appropriate level of zoom so they look sharp rather than a blurry mess, as well as tweaks for the interface and again stability (resolving a crash that happened during text recognition).

With improvements to Media Player (custom captions, bug fixes and better overall reliability) and Sound Recorder, Microsoft is clearly busy with these default apps.

Analysis: a better way of working with updates

Bear in mind that all of these changes are in testing right now, but the various bits of tweaking and new features for Windows 11's core apps shouldn't take long to come through.

The move to consolidate the deployment of Windows 11's updates will take longer, as it's only in the Experimental channel (early testing) right now, and it's just rolling out gradually there. However, it's great to see this inbound, because it's going to represent a major convenience for the average Windows 11 user.

Instead of having to bother with separate updates for firmware, or the .NET framework, or device drivers, Windows Update will bundle them all together with the monthly cumulative update that Microsoft releases. The upshot is that you'll only have to reboot once to apply all those upgrades, and while installation will take longer, simplifying how updates work in this way is definitely worth the trade-off.

This is one of many improvements Microsoft has in the works for Windows 11 updates, and the key piece of functionality that's already in the pipeline is the ability to delay a monthly update indefinitely. Update installation failures have long been a blemish on Microsoft's reputation, too, and moves are afoot to cure these blues.

Apple revealed macOS 27 Golden Gate at WWDC 2026 this week, with the first beta version of its next desktop operating system becoming available to download.

To be clear, this is an initial developer beta not intended for the general computing public – a beta for everyday users won't come until later – but even so, we saw an odd rush to grab this very first release of macOS 27.

Why? It certainly wasn't because Mac owners were very keen to get their pointers on a whole load of shiny, glitzy new features, because as we made clear, macOS 27 doesn't add anything particularly attention-grabbing. Indeed, one of the most notable things about macOS 27 is that it shuts the Golden Gate on Macs that don't run on Apple's M-series silicon (or the A18 Pro in the case of the MacBook Neo), with Intel chips officially being ditched.

Otherwise, macOS 27 is a case of general performance and stability work, as well as honing the interface, and a raft of minor feature additions. So, again – why are Mac owners falling over themselves to download the macOS 27 developer beta? Well, it's because that more humdrum-sounding work on generally fixing macOS when it comes to performance was badly needed after the release of the current iteration of the OS (macOS Tahoe).

In case you weren't aware, then, it isn't just Windows 11 that needs fixing – which Microsoft is in the midst of a major campaign to do – but also macOS. And the good news is that, apparently, Apple has done a great job right off the bat on the recovery front with the first macOS 27 beta – to an eye-opening extent, as you'll see.

Let's explore the broad reaction to macOS 27 with its initial debut in testing – including it being called 'mind-blowing', that's how positive some folks are being – and look at the three main reasons why Golden Gate isn't as lowkey a release as it may seem upon first glance.

1. Tahoe performance headaches seem to have been totally cured in macOS 27

Early adopters of the initial dev beta of macOS 27 are pretty much universally praising the performance boost compared to the current version of the OS, and essentially saying it feels like night-and-day compared to Tahoe.

This Reddit thread is a perfect example, where the original poster claims that: 'Performance is genuinely mind-blowing on the new macOS 27 beta'. They add that "macOS 27 feels incredibly fast compared to Tahoe", and that: "The lag, stutters, and general sluggishness I experienced on Tahoe seem to be completely gone. Apps launch faster, animations are smoother, and the whole system feels much more responsive and polished."

Others chime in with similar thoughts on that thread, and macOS 27 gets nothing less than a glowing write-up. For example: "Gets even better during high-end tasks! It [the MacBook] doesn't heat up as much, and isn't hogging RAM as much as Tahoe was."

Another Redditor says: "Agreed. I have an M1 Pro base as well and performance is so much better than Tahoe. It honestly feels like a new Mac now."

There's a common theme across many online comments from those who've already migrated from Tahoe to Golden Gate in that they're saying that their Mac now feels like a new computer (as per that last comment).

Of course, this is still early days – very early – but it's undeniably a positive sign that Apple is on the right track here. If you've avoided Tahoe due to performance-related concerns then it seems Golden Gate will be your golden ticket to upgrade from macOS Sequoia finally (assuming you don't have an Intel Mac).

2. The first macOS 27 beta is reportedly remarkably stable already – and that bodes well

As well as the observations on distinct and substantial performance improvements across the board, there's another theme with the reaction to macOS 27 so far, namely that it's very stable. And that's pretty remarkable given that this is the initial release of the pre-public (developer) version of Golden Gate – it simply doesn't get any more 'early adopter' than this.

Indeed, the original poster from the above Reddit thread concerning the great performance boost was wowed almost as much by the stability levels in evidence here. They noted: "It's still a beta, but so far the performance is absolutely amazing." And that: "It's pretty wild that a developer beta runs better than the stable version of Tahoe. I'd definitely recommend upgrading."

Someone else adds: "The beta of [macOS] 27 is more stable than macOS 26 during its entire run."

Indeed, there are a fair few Redditors who are chipping in and making comments saying that they'd never normally touch a first beta release, but having read these threads, they've been tempted into taking the plunge and leaving Tahoe behind.

On a more cautious note, I'd be careful about early betas in general, although at this point, macOS 27 is only open to developers anyway – and we explain more about what this means here.

At any rate, there's a double win with the first macOS 27 beta in terms of a big performance improvement combined with stability in spades given the early stage this work is currently at.

3. Apple has ironed out the interface wrinkles introduced with Tahoe

There were a number of frustrations aired about some of the decisions made with the interface in macOS Tahoe, and Apple has set about resolving these in macOS 27.

One key change is the menu icons, which have been widely criticized in Tahoe and even described as 'glaringly inconsistent and often utterly inscrutable', with app menus stuffed full of icons to a bewildering extent – but this has now been cleaned up.

Apple has also addressed complaints around window borders, and there are no more 'floating' sidebars, as they are now edge-to-edge inside their window, as noted by this Redditor. The changes to the Liquid Glass design are also singled out, with Apple ensuring that the transparency effect no longer makes text difficult to read.

As another Redditor put it more broadly: "Golden Gate is very sharp now. On Tahoe everything was so goddamn blurry and it's good now."

Note that Liquid Glass hasn't gone away, it's just been tweaked, and very much for the better by all accounts. There are a whole bunch of other UI tweaks for macOS 27 as highlighted by MacRumors in this list.

Only doing what had to be done?

So, that's all well and good. But while what Apple's done in terms of performance and stability for a first beta may be 'mind-blowing' in some respects, it could also be argued that this is merely to be expected. That's because macOS 27 is mostly about fixing Tahoe, and so that's what Apple has been concentrating on – hence the lack of any major feature additions.

Still, to be fair to Apple, it looks like the company has done a great job. And it is indeed unusual to see feedback praising stability so highly for an initial (dev) beta release. So, let's give credit where it's due, even if this is more a case of necessary refinement, honing, fixing, and generally 'recovering' from Tahoe than it is Golden Gate being any kind of standout leap over its predecessor.

It seems like macOS 27 is going to please a lot of Mac owners when it's released later this year, particularly those with older MacBooks (not too old, though – sorry Intel folks). Meanwhile, on the other side of the fence, Microsoft's efforts to fix Windows 11 – a project set to span the course of this year – are also going well thus far. All this makes me optimistic that perhaps 2027 could be a golden year for desktop operating systems.

• Samsung's XR headset will help you meditate while giving blood
• Employees recently tried the demo, and it'll be available at AWE
• Further expansions are already planned

There are plenty of things in life we know we should be doing but don’t for one reason or another — like eating more vegetables, exercising several times a week, giving our time to good causes, or reading a good book. But for one such activity, giving blood, Samsung and healthcare company Abbott have just showcased a way to make it a bit more bearable: immersive meditation.

To mark World Blood Donor Day, Samsung employees in South Korea had the opportunity to give blood while experiencing immersive meditation, and the company plans to expand the program globally, with events scheduled for the US and Malaysia.

One such activation is happening in just a few days. Attendees at Augmented World Expo in Long Beach, California, next week (June 15 to 18) can take part in Samsung and Abbott’s four-day blood drive.

I’m currently taking part in a medical trial, and as part of it every couple of months I have to get a lot of blood taken. While I am now used to it, I always get stressed out in the moments before the needle goes in, and I can’t relax until I know it’s all over — so some kind of immersive XR experience would be a help.

It would certainly beat my current method of trying to distract myself by talking the nurse’s ear off.

Analysis/subhead section

We’ve seen XR used in similar ways before, for example, some flights now offer VR headset meditation to help calm nervous fliers, and schools have used VR to help bring education to life. These examples give some ideas for how XR can make other mundane parts of our lives a bit more fun.

Gamifying exercise to make it more exciting is a trend that's always being chased, but too often it struggles to pull folks away from a more traditional routine. So instead, I’d like to see an XR glasses app that can work with any gym equipment.

Imagine having an XR coach there to talk you through a routine, with advice for each machine and stats about your last visit, like what weights you were lifting and pushing you to go a little harder if you can. Treadmill runs could come with immersive routes to jog through, or perhaps you could have a virtual you/rival joining you at each machine, giving you someone to compete against.

My next proposal: a reading companion. I know a few teachers, and many have said it’s harder than ever to get kids to read. If you do try to set a reading and then quiz the kids on what the book is about, they’ll just use AI to summarize the story for them.

So what if an XR glasses or headset app could leverage eye-tracking to follow along as you read to see that you’ve actually gone through a book properly. Parents and teachers can then know their kid has been reading and deserves some congratulations, and for the kid, the glasses could help with understanding or pronouncing words, perhaps provide some visual cues to what they’re reading, and help them find similar books once they’re finished.

I’m not envisioning anything supremely immersive, just a few bits to help readers of all ages engage with a story.

Or perhaps we could use XR to help make doing chores less of a, well, chore.

MR apps have been made to show us where we have and haven’t vacuumed, so something similar for dusting, cleaning the bathroom, and other tasks would be great at keeping my home spotless in every way.

I also love listening to music while I clean, so perhaps an XR app could turn my home into a rave that only plays while I’m tidying, helping me push through chores.

These are just a few fun possible examples, but they showcase some of the reasons and ways XR could be an awesome technology as it develops. We’ll just have to wait and see what Samsung, Google, Meta, Apple, and the rest have up their sleeves.

• Microsoft has made a notable move with the Windows App SDK
• It's allowing some AI powers to run on non-Copilot+ PCs without an NPU, using an Nvidia GPU instead
• This is an experimental move for now, but it suggests a wider drive to bring more AI capabilities to all Windows 11 PCs, not just Copilot+ models

Microsoft is planning to bring AI features to a wider set of Windows 11 PCs, allowing devices with suitably beefy GPUs to avail themselves of local AI functionality that's currently restricted to Copilot+ PCs with a fast NPU.

Windows Latest spotted that Microsoft has a new feature in testing — marked as experimental — for the Windows App SDK, which allows developers to run local language models (AI features) on non-Copilot+ PCs by using a GPU.

Microsoft stated: "The Language Model APIs now run on non-Copilot+ PCs equipped with a supported GPU, bringing local language model capabilities to a broader range of Windows 11 devices. Supported hardware includes Nvidia GeForce RTX 30 series and newer with 6+ GB vRAM."

What does this mean in practice? If you're thinking that all Windows 11 PCs are going to get the full range of exclusive Copilot+ AI features — like Recall for example — that isn't the case.

What this is about is allowing software developers to let their apps tap into certain AI features on any Windows 11 PC with a qualifying GPU.

As Windows Latest points out, the move will mean that non-Copilot+ PCs can access Microsoft's Phi Silica small language model and use it locally (on the device, as opposed to reaching out to the cloud) not with an NPU, but with an appropriate Nvidia graphics card (with 6GB of video RAM) instead.

This will allow for basic AI abilities such as rewriting or summarizing text to be carried out within apps where the developer codes for this, outside of the Copilot+ PCs where this would normally be restricted to.

Analysis: an agentic future

The theory is that this is just the initial step, and Microsoft is going to push for the wider deployment of other AI features to non-Copilot PCs.

It also addresses a frustration that was aired in the very early days of Copilot+ PCs, when I remember a bunch of people questioning why Microsoft limited these AI features to devices with NPUs, when a decent GPU was easily capable of accelerating these on-device AI workloads.

This was an arbitrary restriction, of course, but now the questioning shifts to a different line: exactly how many AI powers will Microsoft allow to be pushed onto non-Copilot+ PCs.

Of course, it's notable of late that Microsoft isn't talking about Copilot+ PCs anymore — the brand didn't even get a mention at the company's recent Build conference. AI was very much still a hot topic, of course, and Microsoft appears to be shifting its angle from pushing a specific hardware brand to more widely promoting AI agents, which are to be the next big thing (AI-wise) in Windows 11.

If you thought Microsoft was cutting back on AI in Windows 11, then, this is another sign that the company is going very much in the other direction, and driving to get more AI features onto a wider array of PCs.

When Microsoft initially talked about cutting back on AI bloat — when the fix Windows 11 campaign was first announced — what it really meant was reducing some of the AI-related clutter in certain menus for the OS along with core apps. A trimming of excesses, basically, and away from that, AI remains a key focus for Microsoft, of course — with this latest move underlining that fact.

• Lawmakers in Pennsylvania want new smart glasses rules
• A proposed bill would mandate that glasses display when they are recording video or audio
• This comes after reports that modders are disabling this feature on Meta Ray-Bans for a price

Last week, I covered reports of, let’s face it, creeps who have been modifying their smart glasses (typically Meta Ray-Bans) to secretly record video and snap photos — by disabling the safety light that flashes when the glasses’ camera is in use. Now, Pennsylvania lawmakers want to make private recording with smart glasses a crime.

Representative Joe Ciresi (D-Montgomery), has introduced a bill that would require smart glasses made, sold or used in his state to display a visual indicator (like a light) when the device is recording — though his bill would go beyond video and to audio as well.

Calling the bill’s rules “common-sense privacy safeguards” to prevent the “misuse of emerging technologies.” It would also require device makers to prevent users from disabling the visual indicator.

While Meta has yet to respond to this new proposed bill, a spokesperson did get back to us after my last story, saying, "All technology — whether it's cameras, smartphones, or AI glasses — comes with the same basic expectation: people should behave responsibly and not misuse it.”

Adding “We aggressively target anyone advertising tampering tools, have removed thousands of violating ads and Marketplace listings for these services, and pursue legal action when appropriate," in response to questions about modification services being sold and advertised through Meta’s own Facebook Marketplace platform.

Meta also explained that its teams are working on evolving its measures — so hopefully it’ll find a way to counter the techniques modders have developed to disable the smart glasses' safety light.

The best outcome?

This new bill is one I’m expecting we’ll see echoed across the States and in other regions because it feels like common sense.

As I mentioned before, we’re seeing how folks are being plain weird in public by misusing smart glasses to harass, intimidate, stalk, and spy on people — amongst other creepy behavior — and these actions risk spoiling everyone’s fun.

Cameras on glasses have genuine utility for allowing the AI to identify landmarks or translate signs, or simply snapping a quick first-person shot while you’re on vacation. Having used my Meta Ray-Bans plenty, the camera quality is worse than my phone's, but the big advantage is that the specs can record without taking me out of the moment — you’re living it for real, not behind a phone screen, but still capturing the memory.

But the risks of misuse can be countered by full-on bans, so I’m glad to see Pennsylvania is taking a tactful approach.

We’ll have to see how companies and governments respond to modification services trying to skirt these rules, but this is the best possible next step in the smart glasses safety saga — giving us an increasingly uncommon win in the consumer tech space.

• The Windows 11 June update is now here
• It packs three key features, one of which speeds up the loading of core Windows 11 menus and apps
• There's also a nifty shared audio feature, and a boost for search

Windows 11's latest update is here, and the June patch brings with it a few key changes, and some useful complementary tweaks.

I've picked out the top three features as announced by Microsoft in what's officially called the KB5094126 patch (where does it get these catchy names from?) for Windows 11 24H2 and 25H2. I'll also round up the minor changes in a closing section, so that you can see everything that's new with the June update.

But I'll get to the main addition straight away, as it's a big one that makes Windows 11 feel a lot more responsive.

1. Low Latency Profile sounds dull, but should speed up Windows 11 substantially

The June update represents the beginning of the rollout of Low Latency Profile (LLP), a feature which I, and many others, have been keenly awaiting the arrival of, because it considerably speeds up the general operation of some core Windows 11 features (or at least it should do).

Windows Latest spotted that this is rolling out with the latest Windows 11 update, as part of a tweak to 'general performance', with Microsoft telling us: "This update accelerates app launch and core shell experiences such as Start menu, Search, and Action Center."

LLP means that the operating system calls on the processor to boost its speed — putting the accelerator flat to the floor, effectively, for a brief time (one to three seconds) — when you're opening an app or a Windows 11 menu. In short, whatever app or menu is being loaded appears a good deal more quickly. (Wondering why Microsoft didn't do this in the first place with Windows 11? I've discussed that in the past, along with criticism leveled at this technique for being a 'fudge').

The catch is that, as noted, this is a controlled rollout, meaning it's coming to Windows 11 PCs gradually. So, if you run out and install the June update now you probably won't get LLP right away, and you may have to wait a little while. How long? I refer you to the common saying about a piece of string, because the progression of this rollout will depend on what Microsoft finds as it monitors the PCs which get the feature.

The trouble is there'll be no announcement of LLP arriving on your system, so the only way you'll know it's there is that you'll suddenly notice apps and menus loading a lot more quickly (well, hopefully).

As Windows Latest points out, you can confirm the presence of LLP by installing a utility to monitor your PC's hardware, such as HWMonitor, which displays the CPU's speed (frequency) in real time. If the feature is active on your PC, you'll notice a big spike (to max speed, or very close) when opening any software or menu that triggers LLP. (Try the Start menu or Action Center and see).

(A final note: Windows Latest details how to force-enable LLP if you've installed the June update, but don't yet have it. However, I wouldn't do that, because it involves some fiddling around with a Windows configuration utility. More to the point, Microsoft is deploying this feature gradually, with careful monitoring, for a reason, so queue-jumping the rollout in this way may not be the best idea.)

2. Shared audio experience

This is a relatively simple idea, but a great addition to Windows 11 nonetheless. The new shared audio feature allows you to do just that — have the audio from your PC piped to two different outputs.

So, for example, if you're traveling with someone on the train and want to watch a movie on your laptop together, you can have the sound sent to your headphones and your friend's earbuds too.

3. Windows 11 search improvement

This one's an even more basic tweak, but still a useful one. As of the June update, when using the search function in Windows 11, the operating system will start showing you possible results with as few as two characters having been typed. This means you might see the query you're wanting more quickly, saving you a bit of time.

Bigger changes are coming to Windows 11 search, too, including the ability to handle long compound file names better (which is now in testing), and hopefully we'll eventually get the most important move of all — the ability to get rid of web results in search.

Other changes with Windows 11's June update

This latest update also brings in improvements on the accessibility front, with Magnifier now able to provide "clearer and more consistent announcements" when it's working with a screen-reading tool (such as announcing when it's zooming in or out).

There's also a new Multi-App Camera feature which means that multiple applications can access your webcam at the same time. And finally, a small tweak for the installation process: on setup, Windows 11 now allows you to choose a custom name for the user folder.

• Apple Maps is getting a huge Flyover visual upgrade
• It will use Vision Intelligence and aerial imagery to create detailed 3D models of city landscapes
• It looks like Apple has also adopted Gaussian Splatting to help render its 3D models

Apple’s upcoming iOS 27 upgrade isn't just about fancy new AI upgrades like the new Siri voice assistant — but Apple Maps is also getting quite a noticeable revamp.

During its WWDC 2026 keynote, Apple took a moment to shine a light on the new visual upgrade for the Flyover tool in Apple Maps, which allows you to view over 350 global cities in 3D from a bird's eye perspective. In iOS 27, Flyover will display buildings and natural landscapes alike using a combination of aerial imagery and Apple’s own Vision Intelligence models to produce 3D views that are even more detailed.

Though Apple didn’t go into further detail, the images used in the WWDC presentation suggest that the company has also adopted Gaussian Splatting to create its 3D landscapes, a graphics technique that uses video footage as the foundation to build a 3D framework. The tool could really give Apple a huge leg-up over Google Maps, which still uses photogrammetry to generate its own 3D models.

It’s not a theory that’s completely out of the question; there are users out there who have also pointed this out after seeing the newly rendered imagery in Apple’s keynote (see below).

Flyover’s enhanced imagery is designed to bring out every visual aspect of Apple Map’s 3D aerial views, including the nitty gritty parts that go unnoticed. Speaking at WWDC, Vice President of OS Program Management, Stacey Ford, shared the following: “From beautiful architectural details to the shapes of individual trees, to the way light reflects off the glass of skyscrapers, you’ll see cities around the world like never before”.

The update is quite a big technical shift for Apple Maps, and will join other upgrades from macOS Golden Gate, to custom AirPods EQ adjustments in iOS 27. The only downside is that you’ll have to wait a bit to test out Flyover’s new look, as iOS 27 is expected to roll out publicly in September — but you can register as a developer and download the first iOS 27 beta now.

Although there’s still a few months left to wait, users have spotted signs that Apple is tinkering with Flyover ahead of the wider iOS 27 rollout.

When the announcement was shared to the r/AppleMaps community on Reddit, users flocked to the comments to share more theories. One user believes Apple is conducting a “weird rollout”, who says that switching to iOS 27 reverts previously-supported cities to low-quality satellite images, while newly-supported cities receive the visual upgrade.

From the user’s experience, they recall seeing a handful of US locations including San Antonio, Houston, Dallas, and Phoenix revert to 2D, as well as international cities such as Sydney, Paris, and Stockholm. On the other hand, Vegas, London, Berlin, Barcelona, and others have been upgraded.

At the moment it’s still very much a guessing game, and Apple probably won’t provide further information until we get closer to the wider iOS 27 launch later this year. That said, Apple’s move from photogrammetry to Gaussian Splatting marks a big shift in digital map rendering, and now we’re just waiting for Google Maps to follow suit.

I come here to celebrate Apple delivering. It's not overshooting the mark with the new Siri AI, which it unveiled at WWDC 2026, but it is finally delivering on the promises it made at WWDC 2024.

Sure, it's beta (again), and there's a wait list (again), but I've now seen it at work, in person, in live and potentially unpredictable demos. Siri AI, as it's now called, works across platforms, and it has the potential to change how you use your iPhone, iPad, and Mac.

While I waited for my access to the new Siri on my iPhone 17 Pro, I visited one of the countless rooms in Apple's massive Apple Park headquarters, where I round-robined through a series of stations at which I could see Siri AI in action on iOS 27 Dev Beta, iPadOS 27 Dev Beta, and macOS Golden Gate Dev Beta. This is all a work in progress.

I'll admit that while I was probably most interested in the new Siri on the iPhone, I was most surprised by how it works on the iPad. On every platform, this smarter, more aware, and more personable Siri looks different than before. It's bigger, brighter, floatier (I made that a word), and it has a new sense of confidence.

On the iPad, you can summon Siri with your voice, but you can also swipe down from the top of the screen, and a sort of black teardrop will form until it releases from the top of the screen and is displayed as the small Siri AI window. It's a nice, classy touch.

Of course, you can type into Siri, and I watched as we searched for top PGA golfers, and I noticed how anxious new Siri was to get to work, auto-filling answers before we'd even finished our query. Since it initially had just 'Top PGA Golfers', it quickly spit out Jack Nicklaus before refining on the fly to more contemporary players like Scottie Scheffler.

I also noticed during this process a new 'working' iconography that looks unlike any previous form of Apple's 'Please wait for an answer' spinner. Sometimes Siri AI seems whip-fast; other times, you can watch that icon spin as it works. There's no obvious sense of, "Oh, it's heading out to the Private Cloud Compute for that."

I watched here and on other platforms as Siri AI effortlessly kept context, without demanding a restate or telling us it couldn't answer that, and "did we want to check the web?" or "Use ChatGPT?" In fact, ChatGPT appears to have been almost fully deprecated here. It does not show up as an option, though I believe you can still request it.

As we dug in on Scheffler's career, Apple was quick to show me how Siri AI always shows its sources. I appreciate the care.

The little Siri AI window that appears in a session can be easily expanded, and then you're suddenly in the new Siri app. Apple takes a slightly different approach here than, say, Gemini or ChatGPT: the chat window is familiar-looking, but the conversation history is card-based, with almost headlines for your query topic, and either a brief summary or image. I did not see an option for a tighter list form, which I might prefer.

iPhone, meet the new Siri

On the iPhone 17 Pro Max, we summoned Siri with a long press of the power button, which launched that new, large, almost alien spaceship-like floating blob. I say 'floating' because throughout the demo I noticed that Apple had made the effort to put very subtle shading under the new Siri interface so that it looks like it's floating just above the screen. It's a neat little effect.

Siri AI's superpower is not that it's smarter or more chatty (in fact, Siri will steer you away from conversations that might be better had with humans or, say, mental health support professionals); it's that it understands you through the data on your phone.

This is where the fulfillment of a promise comes in. Siri AI really does appear to know the contents of your phone in a way that could be truly helpful. Its needle-in-the-haystack approach means that, if you have a thread of memory about a bit of data, something someone mentioned to you in an email or message, Siri can dig it out for you.

In the demo I saw, we asked about a "podcast our sister recommended recently," and Siri searched across first-party apps (developers will have to build hooks into Siri AI in future versions of their apps) and pulled up a casual mention of a Sherlock Holmes podcast in Messages. Again, once we had that detail, we only had to say, "Play it," and Siri launched the podcast app.

The obvious benefit is the end of endless searching and then backing out and finding the right app. I could imagine a lot of your daily interactions with your iPhone getting done through Siri AI. Of course, much of this will depend on developers of apps like WhatsApp, Gmail, and others building in those Siri connections.

Still, the power here is exciting. Taking someone's lengthy emails full of useful but disorganized details and turning them into, say, a useful Camping Gear list in Notes is a significant leap from the current and endlessly disappointing "Sorry, I can't do that" Siri.

Over the course of my demo, I watched as Siri pulled up random references relating to queries about travel and meteor showers. It's sort of a de-randomizer. Like all good AI, Siri AI can see the patterns in your endless reams of data, and make sense of it.

I also got a look at Siri in the Camera app. That's right, it now has a menu item right next to 'Photo,' and once launched it works a bit like Visual Intelligence. Choosing it does mean that Siri can 'see what you see,' which may or may not comfort you, but if you're wondering what you're looking at or, say, want Siri to help you make a choice, it's ready. I did notice that the Camera app takes a photo of whatever Siri is analyzing.

At one point, we mispoke in the demo, but Siri sussed out the proper prompt and results without any intervention from us. Kind of impressive.

In a demo where it helped me decide which book to read next, I listened as Siri's new 'expressive' voice told me why I should read Blindsight next. I noticed, though, that the new voice sounded a bit odd. I don't know if the emotion sounded forced or missing, but I'm assuming this is an element that's still being tweaked in iOS 27 Dev Beta.

Spotlight on the Mac

Most of my Mac demo revolved around how Siri AI transforms Spotlight, the Mac's system-wide search engine. You can, it turns out, still use it to launch apps like Preview, but the new interface almost compels you to go further with the words, 'Search or Ask'.

Ask basically transforms Spotlight into a generative search box where almost any general knowledge question is welcomed. We asked about the Hawaiian islands for families. If the system deems the question as 'complex,' it will default to Siri and Apple's world Knowledge Engine. That's right, even though the new Siri is using, in part, Gemini Foundation models, Apple is not using Google's Search knowledge graph.

Once you launch a search, you're inside Siri, and you can keep that window open while you multitask on other desktop chores.

In Apple Intelligence, you select text and right-click to access AI-powered writing tools, but the new Siri is embedded in more subtle ways that still give you full access to its new power. We selected a bunch of text in Notes and, while we could still have Siri rewrite it, Writing Tools-style, we can also use this as a launch point to weave together other Apple first-party app capabilities. In this case, we asked it to use the notes to draft a structured email in Mail.

Again, this is a pair of first-party Apple apps working together, and Apple is well aware that your email client may not be Apple's Mail.

Overall, it's still just a glimpse of what Siri AI can do, but I find it a promising one, especially for beta software. The plumbing clearly works, and if you allow it, Siri can finally see across your iPhone, iPad, and Mac to understand you and your needs. It's been a long time coming, but I think Apple finally got this right.

If you're using an older Mac or MacBook with an Intel chip, then we have bad news, as Apple has quietly killed off support for any device sold before 2020 that doesn't have an Arm-based Apple silicon chip (that is, Macs with M1 chips or newer, or the A18 Pro, in the MacBook Neo's case).

Apple announced macOS 27 Golden Gate at WWDC 2026, and highlighted new features and performance improvements. However, it didn't reveal which Macs would be getting the upcoming operating system, which is due to release 'this Fall', so expect it about October.

Instead, we found confirmation tucked away at the bottom of the macOS news site. This is a bit cheeky, as it's a major change that will impact a lot of people, though it's also not that surprising, as it was only a matter of time before Apple dropped support for older Macs.

This also means there's no Mac Pro or iMac Pro model which can run macOS 27. Will Apple silicon models come out this year for those super-powerful workstations? Let's hope.

Bye bye Intel

Here is the list of Macs and MacBooks that will be able to run macOS 27 Golden Gate:

• MacBook Air M1 or later
• MacBook Pro M1 or later
• MacBook Pro 13-inch M1 2020 or later
• MacBook Pro 14-inch M1 Pro 2021 or later
• MacBook Pro 16-inch M1 Pro 2021 or later
• MacBook Neo
• iMac M1 2020 or later
• Mac mini M1 2020 or later
• Mac Studio 2022 and later

By concentrating on its own chips, which use Arm architecture, Apple also no longer has to worry about Macs running on Intel's x86 chip tech, which will hopefully mean the macOS team has more scope to improve the performance of the software and add features in the future.

If you have an Intel Mac, you can continue to use it with macOS 26, though running an older operating system that might not get security updates in the future isn't recommended. So, it might be time to consider a new Mac — see below for some top deals.

• MacBook Air M1 or later
• MacBook Pro M1 or later
• MacBook Pro 13-inch M1 2020 or later
• MacBook Pro 14-inch M1 Pro 2021 or later
• MacBook Pro 16-inch M1 Pro 2021 or later
• MacBook Neo
• iMac M1 2020 or later
• Mac mini M1 2020 or later
• Mac Studio 2022 and later

WWDC 2026, this year's edition of Apple's software-focused developer conference, has been particularly notable due to it being the last one with Tim Cook as CEO — he'll be handing over the reins to John Ternus later this year. But it's also given us a glimpse of what the future holds for Macs and MacBooks, with the announcement of macOS 27 Golden Gate.

Unlike Microsoft's rival Windows operating system, Apple releases yearly major updates to its macOS operating system which come with a new name (usually taken from a Californian landmark) and number, which now reflects the year of release. While macOS 27 will release at the end of 2026, Apple will count 2027 as its main release year, so it doesn't feel outdated a few months after it lands on people's hard drives.

While WWDC 2026 is noteworthy for being Cook's last event, this year's macOS update is less exciting, and is mainly focused on performance improvements (which are always welcome), and AI integration (less welcome).

Still, it's an update anyone with a Mac or MacBook will want to download, as long as your device is compatible, so read on to find out what's new.

A note about compatibility: perhaps the most noticable change with macOS 27 Golden Gate is that Intel-based Macs and MacBooks are no longer supported. Only Macs that have Apple silicon chips (so, M1 Macs and MacBooks or newer) will be able to install macOS 27.

macOS 27 Golden Gate: at a glance

• What is it? The newest operating system for Macs and MacBooks
• When will it be out? A beta for developers is available to download right now, full version likely in October 2026 ('coming this Fall' according to Cook)
• How much will it cost? As usual, macOS 27 will be a free upgrade for everyone who has a compatible device

macOS 27 Golden Gate: Compatibility

Want to know if your Mac will be compatible with macOS 27 Golden Gate? Here’s the full list of Macs that’ll be able to run the operating system:

• MacBook Air M1 or later
• MacBook Pro M1 or later
• MacBook Pro 13-inch M1 2020 or later
• MacBook Pro 14-inch M1 Pro 2021 or later
• MacBook Pro 16-inch M1 Pro 2021 or later
• MacBook Neo
• iMac M1 2020 or later
• Mac mini M1 2020 or later
• Mac Studio 2022 and later

You'll notice that no Macs made before 2020 are supported. That's because macOS 27 Golden Gate is only compatible with Macs running on Apple's own M-series chips (or the A18 Pro, in the MacBook Neo's case).

This is a major change, and could see a lot of people unable to upgrade. Apple likely sees dropping older Intel models as a clean break, and means macOS 27 Golden Gate can include a big focus on AI features — the old Intel chips don't have NPUs for on-device AI.

By concentrating on its own chips, which use Arm architecture, Apple also no longer has to worry about Macs running on Intel's x86 chip tech, which will hopefully mean the macOS team has more time to improve the performance of the software and add features in the future.

If you have an Intel Mac, you can continue to use it with macOS 26, though running an not-updated operating system isn't recommended. So, it might be time to consider a new Mac — see below for some top deals.

macOS 27 Golden Gate: release date

The developer beta preview for macOS 27 is available today, but you probably don't want to install that.

For a start, you need to be a developer to download this beta, and that requires signing up and paying for a developer account. The public beta, which will come out in July, will be free, as will the final version when it launches later in the year.

Secondly, developer betas are very early versions of software that are mainly designed for (as the name suggests) software developers to test and make sure their apps are compatible. So, they're often very barebones, with missing features and plenty of bugs.

The public beta will hopefully be more stable, but there could still be problems, so I recommend most people wait until the final version is released, especially if you're installing macOS 27 on a device you rely on every day.

macOS 27 Golden Gate: new features

1. Liquid Glass tweaks

Last year's macOS 26 brought a major design change with its Liquid Glass theme. While macOS 27 doesn't bring another major change to the interface, it does address some of the common complaints about Liquid Glass, especially the issue with transparency effects (which gives the interface its name) making text hard to read.

It will diffuse shadows to make it easier to read, and there's a new slider to adjust the transparency of Liquid Glass.

2. General performance improvements

The major focus of macOS 27 will be making the operating system feel faster and more responsive on Macs and MacBooks, so while the new features might not be that exciting, you should hopefully notice an improvement in the overall performance of your Mac — and for free!

'Responsiveness' is an important word, with animations feeling faster, and Apple promises that Mac apps will load 30% faster thanks to pre-loading.

Photos should appear in your gallery faster, and AirDrop sharing is up to 80% faster.

3. Better Search in macOS

Search has been rebuilt on iOS and macOS for Spotlight, Photos, and Mail (new ranking system for more relevant results), so finding files and folders on your Mac should be a lot easier.

4. Improved parental controls

This is quite a hot topic at the moment, and it's good to see Apple has taken the protection of children seriously. Alongside the existing parental controls, macOS 27 Golden Gate will let parents put a block on apps, and there are now tools that will prevent unsuitable images, including nudity and gore, from being seen.

"We're giving powerful tools to parents," according to Craig Federighi, Senior Vice President of Software Engineering at Apple.

5. Siri AI

Personally, I've never felt the need to use Siri much on a Mac, unlike on iPhones and iPads where the virtual assistant feels like a more natural fit.

That could change with the new overhauled Siri, which after several delays, will be a key part of macOS 27 Golden Gate. With advanced AI features, courtesy of Google's Gemini, the new and improved Siri will be able to complete tasks with just a voice command (or text prompt), such as write emails for you, and it can also detect what's on your screen.

Siri will also make using the Calendar app in macOS better, as you can ask it to create events for you, and it can even check to see if you're available before you respond to invites.

There will be a new Siri app for macOS, where you can have conversations with the assistant, as well as see previous chats, much like you would see text messages in the Messages app. Conversations are synced with iCloud, so you'll be able to continue them on your iPhone or iPad.

You also get system-wide context menus, and Siri AI is now integrated directly into Spotlight, where you can ask Siri questions without going into an app. A keyboard shortcut will bring up Visual Intelligence, so you can ask Siri about things on your screen.

6. Image Playground improvements

Image Playground, the generative AI tool that turns prompts into images, has a new look that's easier to use, and it's getting an option that allows you to create wallpapers using AI.

A new model allows for photo-realistic images, and you can use it on your own photos, and nothing is uploaded or shared - it's all done on-device.