The gist: To anyone listening closely to what Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has been saying over the past couple of years, this week felt like the clearest sign yet that AI is about to fundamentally change the size of Microsoft's workforce. Microsoft is now offering voluntary buyouts to around 60,000 employees across the US, UK, C
The gist: For more than 15 years, Apple has had a pretty simple answer to the idea of a touchscreen MacBook: no. Yesterday, Apple finally decided to think different and announce one anyway. "You've gotta touch it to believe it," says Apple CEO John Ternus. He might be right: I haven't yet touched it, and I still […]
The gist: Microsoft just posted the first quarter of its 2027 fiscal financial results. The software maker made $92.3 billion in revenue and a net income of $33.6 billion during Q1. Revenue is up 19 percent, and net income has increased by 32 percent. It's a new financial year for Microsoft, so the company is changing up […]
The gist: Xbox's first chief operating officer (COO) is leaving after the new role was created just a few months ago. Helen Chiang is leaving Microsoft today, according to an internal Xbox memo seen by The Verge. Chiang has been at Microsoft for 21 years, serving as the head of Minecraft before being promoted to Xbox chief […]
The gist: Microsoft is closing down The Garage, a set of popular maker spaces where employees worked on experimental projects and collaborated on surprising new apps and hardware during the company's annual hackathon events. "We're winding down The Garage program as a centralized function," says Microsoft in an internal FAQ to e
The gist: Microsoft asked its employees to return to the office three days per week last year, and it's now upping this requirement to four days a week for most Xbox employees. An internal memo, seen by The Verge, describes the change as a "need to create more opportunities for people to work together" after feedback from […]
The gist: Microsoft announced last month that it will let anyone access Xbox Cloud Gaming in November, without the need to subscribe to Xbox Game Pass. The new pay-as-you-go model will require players to purchase bundles of cloud hours, and now Microsoft is revealing today that bundles will start at $3.99 for 10 hours of cloud p
The gist: Nvidia is rolling out a new GPU driver today (621.01) that enables Microsoft's new Advanced Shader Delivery technology to speed up game launches. The technology also removes mid-game "just-in-time" shader compilation, reducing stuttering and CPU spikes. Microsoft's Advanced Shader Delivery works by offloading shader co
The gist: Microsoft is reportedly planning to launch an Xbox "next-generation handheld device" for the holiday season of 2027. The Xbox next-gen console, codename Project Helix, would then launch in the holidays of 2028, according to a new report from Fortune. The report doesn't make it clear whether the handheld would be made b
The gist: AMD has just revealed that it's bringing its latest upscaling technology, FSR 4.1, to the Xbox Series S and X consoles, as well as laptops, 6000-series GPUs, and handhelds like the Xbox Ally X devices. FSR 4.1 will start appearing for Radeon RX 6000-series GPUs today, as well as Ryzen AI Max 300 and 400 […]
The gist: After setting up Microsoft's Surface Laptop Ultra, I spent five minutes just staring at it. I wasn't surprised by its MacBook Pro-like design or blown away by its bright display. I was trying to work out what I'd actually do with a $5,900 laptop. This isn't just any regular Windows laptop. Microsoft has teamed up […]
The gist: Microsoft and Nvidia held a launch party for the first wave of RTX Spark laptops last week in San Francisco, where a new wave of AI PCs took center stage amid a packed crowd and a lively hands-on area. A day after the media event, I was invited to a quieter Nvidia event to hear […]
The gist: Earlier this year Microsoft laid out a plan to fix Windows 11, with a focus on performance, reliability, and the overall OS experience. After months of fixes, Microsoft now says the "result is a Windows experience that's up to 20 percent more responsive." Microsoft has made improvements to Start, File Explorer, Search,
The gist: Microsoft is officially announcing its Xbox Nano controller today, a smaller and cheaper controller that's designed to fit into your pocket. The more compact controller is also designed for "younger players, smaller hands, or anyone seeking something portable for play on the go." The $49.99 Xbox Nano is Microsoft's sma
The gist: Retro gaming is going through a wild time at the moment, thanks to decompilations and recompilations that are letting gamers port classic titles to new devices, or merge code from two different games into a single new experience. Microsoft has witnessed skateboarding being modded into Call of Duty and Halo being played
The gist: When Nvidia originally showed off DLSS 5 earlier this year, the technology immediately got branded as gen AI for video games. To gamers, Nvidia had lost the plot. I personally couldn't get over how faces were transformed using DLSS 5. The 15-year-old student from Hogwarts Legacy suddenly looked much older, and Grace fr
The gist: Elgato already dominates the market for hardware built for creators that use powerful desktop PCs, and it's now turning its attention to creators on the go with its first wireless microphone. The $99.99 Wave Go clips onto your clothes just like DJI's Mic Mini, with hands-free recording for vlogging and content creation
The gist: Microsoft is announcing its third-generation Maia in-house AI chip today, designed to be the "primary AI inference system" for Microsoft's products and services. Maia 300 not only improves the cost and efficiency of running AI workloads in the cloud, it's also more capable of handling the latest reasoning models and ag
The gist: When Microsoft released Windows 11 five years ago, it felt like an operating system that was still being renovated, a work in progress. You'd think by now that those renovations would be complete, with Microsoft turning its attention to Windows 12. Instead, Windows 11 feels like it's here to stay, forming the foundatio
The gist: Microsoft bundled its AI-powered Office features into Microsoft 365 Personal and Family subscriptions last year, but it only allowed the primary account holder to access the AI benefits. Now, Microsoft is about to let Microsoft 365 Family and Premium subscribers share Copilot and AI usage features, alongside access to
The gist: Windows Search has been one of the most frustrating parts of Windows 11, and now Microsoft is addressing this with a significant overhaul. A new redesigned Windows Search is now in testing that is much faster, more capable, and a lot more modern. "This new Windows Search experience is built for speed," says Anshul Rawa
The gist: Playground Games first revealed earlier this year that Forza Horizon 6 would be arriving on PS5 in 2026, but the launch is now being pushed back. I reported last month that there would be a delay to early next year, and Forza Horizon 6 is now officially debuting on January 26th, 2027. The delay means […]
The gist: Before Microsoft releases a laptop to the public, it needs to put the device through its paces. That all happens inside a windowless, warehouse-like lab on the company's Redmond, Washington, campus, where the team developing Surface devices programs robots to press their buttons thousands of times, pelts devices with r
The gist: Months after revealing its Surface Laptop Ultra, Microsoft has announced that the Nvidia RTX Spark-equipped device will launch on October 16th. Pricing starts at $2,599 for the base configuration, featuring an 18-core CPU, 24GB of RAM, and 512GB of storage. The Surface Laptop Ultra ships with a 15-inch HDR touchscreen
The gist: Microsoft has created a magnetic charging solution for its Surface Laptop Ultra that uses USB-C. After scrapping its proprietary Surface Connect magnetic charging on its smaller Surface devices last year, the Surface Laptop Ultra has a charging cable that attaches magnetically to the right side USB-C port. During Micro
The gist: We're in San Francisco today to hear what's next for Windows and Surface. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, and Windows and Surface chief Pavan Davuluri will all be holding a "conversation on how local AI will shape the next chapter of the PC." Microsoft and Nvidia have been working together on the
The gist: Microsoft is heading to San Francisco this morning to reveal what's coming next for Windows and Surface and a "conversation on how local AI will shape the next chapter of the PC." That conversation will include Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, and Windows and Surface chief Pavan Davuluri. I'm expec
The gist: Xbox CEO Asha Sharma told employees that Microsoft is getting ready to do something around Grand Theft Auto VI that "no other platform holder is doing" during an employee all-hands this morning. According to sources familiar with Microsoft's plans, Sharma's brief teaser was actually about Xbox managing to land a deal f
The gist: After nearly 18 years at LinkedIn and Microsoft, Ryan Roslansky is leaving the company. Roslansky, who until recently was the CEO of LinkedIn, was promoted to the head of Office last year and then took control of Microsoft Teams earlier this year. Roslansky's departure has triggered another leadership shuffle inside Mi
The gist: Last week, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella hosted an intimate, invite-only event for leaders from some of its key enterprise customers. Instead of a flashy media event, Nadella outlined the future of Copilot directly to the customers Microsoft really cares about, pitching its latest rethink of the AI assistant as the "OS f
