Microsoft released a new development build of Windows 11 to the Dev Channel this week. Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 25272 is a bug fix release for the most part, but it makes an important change and is therefore noteworthy.
The release notes reveal that Microsoft removed the recommended websites feature in the Start Menu.
"We are removing the suggestion action for searching copied text in Microsoft Edge and showing recommend common websites on the Recommended section in Start – both of which began rolling out with Build 25247."
Microsoft started showing website recommendations in an earlier build in the Dev channel. The company received criticism for this, as it seemed to introduce another advertising possibility to the operating system.
Patrick's article on annoying Windows 11 Dev channel features that should get dropped included website recommendations.
Arguments leveled against the feature included the following points:
- Recommended focused on recently opened files and installed apps previously for the most part. Website recommendations would take away space from these user-specific recommendations.
- Listing websites under recommended could pave the way for adding more advertisement to the Start Menu of the operating system.
The feature has been removed by Microsoft in this week's Dev Channel Insider build for Windows 11. It seems unlikely that it is going to make a return in a future build.
Edge and Bing Search Suggested Actions is also gone
The very same build of Windows 11 removes another feature that testers found annoying for the most part. A new suggested action feature that pushes Microsoft Edge whenever text was copied on the operating system.
Windows 11 would display a prompt to run a search for the text on Bing using Microsoft Edge; this happened even if another default browser was set on the system already.
Windows 11 users had to disable the Suggested Actions feature in its entirety to disable the prompts.
Closing Words
Windows 11 Developer builds are designed for testing. Some features that Microsoft tests won't make it into the Stable versions of the operating system, and that is sometimes a good thing.
In this case, Microsoft made the right decision to remove the two features again. They offered little of use, as the features were designed more to Microsoft's benefit than the user's.
Now You: what is your take on the features and the removal?
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