rolling out —
Windows 11's third annual update includes a subtle under-the-hood overhaul.
Microsoft
Microsoft will begin rolling this year's annual Windows 11 update out to consumers starting today, the company announced at a Windows- and Copilot-centric event today. The Windows 11 2024 Update, also known as Windows 11 24H2, will roll out in phases, starting with Windows 11 PCs running versions 22H2 or 23H2 that have opted in to getting new feature updates faster.
New features in 24H2 include an Energy Saver feature that replaces the older Battery Saver settings, support for Wi-Fi 7 and 80Gbps USB4 Version 2.0 ports, text labels for common actions like copy and paste in the right-click/context menu, and tweaks to how the Quick Settings panels work.
For the handful of PCs that meet Microsoft's requirements for the Copilot+ program—16GB of RAM, 256GB of storage, and a neural processing unit (NPU) capable of at least 40 trillion operations per second (TOPS)—Windows 11 24H2 will eventually add support for the overhauled Recall feature, a better Windows Search function, a "super resolution" feature for the Photos app that offers to upscale older pictures, generative fill and erase features in the Paint app, and other features.
The 24H2 update is the biggest change to Windows 11 since the 22H2 update two years ago and may be the most significant update the operating system has seen since it was released in 2021 (credible rumors had it pegged as "Windows 12," though Microsoft ultimately decided not to change the branding). The 23H2 update was largely a continuation of 22H2 that reset the clock for security updates but didn't actually change the underlying operating system.
Aside from app updates and UI changes, Microsoft has said that 24H2 includes significant updates to the compiler, kernel, and scheduler, as well as improved performance and compatibility for the operating system's Arm-to-x86 app translation layer (now called "Prism").
The 24H2 update has been available in the Windows Insider Release Preview channel since May (with one brief gap), which means that the build is generally considered stable for day-to-day use but that users may still run into occasional edge cases. But for some new PCs—including Snapdragon X-equipped Copilot+ PCs and laptops with new AI-focused processors from AMD and Intel—Windows 11 24H2 has already been shipping for months. Today's announcement applies to Windows 11 PCs that are already running an older version.
The 24H2 update doesn't change the official requirements for Windows 11, which still ask for a PC made around 2018 or so. The requirements for an unsupported install have increased, likely as a side effect of those compiler and kernel updates—Windows 11 will only boot on 64-bit PCs that support the SSE 4.2 instruction set and the POPCNT instruction. Intel added SSE 4.2 support starting in its first-generation Core CPUs back in 2008, while AMD added them to its Bulldozer architecture back in 2011; this cuts out many older 64-bit Intel Core 2 and AMD Athlon and Sempron CPUs that could boot older versions of Windows 11 in a pinch.