Here are the biggest announcements coming out of Microsoft Build 2023

These are the headlines from Microsoft’s annual developer conference.

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.

Microsoft’s annual Build developer conference has started! Day one has just wrapped up, and while we do expect there to be more keynotes and sessions tomorrow, we wanted to round up all of the biggest news coming out ofBuild 2023so far.

The company has published anonline “Book of News” that rounds up all the announcements, but it’s a super long list. We’ve riddled it down to just the biggest announcements coming out of Redmond, focused on Windows, Microsoft 365, and you guessed it, AI.

Microsoft is an AI company now, so you’ll be unsurprised to hear that a majority of the announcements being made at Build this year are tied to AI in some form. Even Windows is getting in on the action with its own AI Copilot, which you can learn more about below.

Windows Copilot

Windows is the first PC platform to announce centralized AI assistance for customers. Together with Bing Chat and first- and third-party plugins, users can focus on bringing their ideas to life, completing complex projects and collaborating instead of spending energy finding, launching and working across multiple applications.

Windows Copilot provides personalized answers and helps users take action within Windows 11, like changing a setting, playing a specific playlist or opening a relevant app.

Microsoft says the new Copilot acts like your “personal assistant” for everything Windows, essentially replacing Cortana that came before it. You can ask it to configure Windows settings, open apps, analyze text and images within apps, initiate snap assist, check for updates, and more. It’s a tool for controlling many aspects of your computer, turning everyone into a power user.

Unsurprisingly, the Windows Copilot is based on the same AI technology that Microsoft has been using as part ofBing Chat, meaning you can ask Windows Copilot to search the web in addition to helping out with tasks ongoing locally on your PC. It even supportsBing Chat and ChatGPT plugins, making Windows Copilot an extensible platform.

Get the Windows Central Newsletter

All the latest news, reviews, and guides for Windows and Xbox diehards.

Windows Copilot will start to become available in preview for Windows 11 in June.Learn more in our announcement post.

Windows 11

Microsoft unveiled several new features that it’s working on for the next version of Windows 11, much of which is expected to ship later this year.

Microsoft has been testing the next version of Windows 11 in preview for a handful of weeks. So far, we know the company is working on amajor update to File Explorerwith modern interfaces, and a newGallery feature for viewing photos. Here’s a rundown of all the features that Microsoft has announced are in the works for Windows 11 today:

Learn more about the new Windows 11 features coming soon.

Microsoft Store

Microsoft unveiled a number of new features and enhancements coming to the Microsoft Store app on Windows 11 later this year, many of which are focused on AI:

Learn more about the new features coming to the Microsoft Store.

Microsoft Edge

Microsoft 365 Copilot, currently in private preview, will be natively integrated into Microsoft Edge, the AI-powered browser for the web. Microsoft 365 Copilot will bring powerful work-based capabilities to answer questions, complete tasks and more to the Edge sidebar.

Microsoft Edge is evolving into a dedicated work experience with its own visual elements, including an updated icon, the organization’s name and other cues. This new experience, called Microsoft Edge for Business, will have a rich set of enterprise controls, security and productivity features.

Microsoft Edge Workspaces, which lets users share, organize and browse the same set of browser tabs together, will be generally available in the next few months for enterprises and will add consumer access.

Lastly, Microsoft announced that a new Edge UI will begin rolling out with the next Edge update, expected in the first week of June.

Learn more about the new Edge.

Microsoft 365

Developers can now integrate their apps and services into Microsoft 365 Copilot with plugins, now in private preview.

Plugins for Microsoft 365 Copilot will include ChatGPT and Bing plugins, as well as Microsoft Teams message extensions and Power Platform connectors. And developers will be able to easily build new Microsoft 365 plugins with the Microsoft Teams Toolkit for Visual Studio Code and Visual Studio.

Developers will be able to extend Microsoft 365 Copilot by bringing their data into the Microsoft Graph, contextualizing relevant and actionable information with the Semantic Index for Copilot in preview.

Avatars for Microsoft Teams will be generally available for all Microsoft 365 Business and Enterprise licenses starting this week in the Teams desktop app on Windows and Mac. Avatars for Microsoft Teams offers an alternative to the current binary option of video or no video and features customizable avatars and reactions.

Learn more about Microsoft 365 and Teams news.

Microsoft Bing

Microsoft is announcing that it will adopt the same open plugin standard that OpenAI introduced for ChatGPT, enabling interoperability across ChatGPT and the breadth of Microsoft’s copilot offerings.

Developers can now use one platform to build plugins that work across both consumer and business surfaces, including ChatGPT, Bing, Dynamics 365 Copilot (in preview) and Microsoft 365 Copilot (in preview). If users want to develop and use their own plugins with their AI app built on Azure OpenAI Service it will, by default, be interoperable with this same plugin standard. This means developers can build experiences that enable people to interact with their apps using the most natural user interface: the human language.

As part of this shared plugin platform, Bing is adding to its support for plugins. In addition to previously announced plugins for OpenTable and Wolfram Alpha, Microsoft also will have Expedia, Instacart, Kayak, Klarna, Redfin and Zillow, among many others, in the Bing ecosystem.

In addition to the common plugin platform, Microsoft is announcing that Bing is coming to ChatGPT as the default search experience. ChatGPT will now have a world-class search engine built in to provide more up-to-date answers with access from the web. Now, answers are grounded by search and web data and include citations so users can learn more, all directly from within chat. The new experience is rolling out to ChatGPT Plus subscribers starting today and will be available to free users soon by simply enabling a plugin.

Learn more about Bing and ChatGPT plugins.

Zac Bowden is a Senior Editor at Windows Central. Bringing you exclusive coverage into the world of Windows on PCs, tablets, phones, and more. Also an avid collector of rare Microsoft prototype devices! Keep in touch onTwitterandThreads