Windows Search is becoming your PC’s new AI-powered control center

Eventually, Windows Search will start calling on other applications, including Copilot, to provide answers and complete tasks. Pavan Davuluri, Microsoft’s executive vice president of Windows, says “thousands” of these actions are headed your way by year’s end.

You’re not just searching. You’re doing. Weird. Or is it?

Let’s back up a bit. In July, Microsoft said it was moving to a quieter, purpose-built iteration of Windows Search, following an earlier mega-memo about simplifying and focusing Windows. That included cutting out unnecessary uses of Copilot — bye, Notepad Copilot — and moving to a new framework called WinUI 3, which Microsoft thinks is more efficient and will speed up Windows as a whole.

That’s happening, Microsoft said this week, as part of an update provided to Microsoft’s Experimental Insider Channel. Windows is getting faster! That’s good.

But from a design standpoint, things are getting a little odd. Originally, the Search app featured recommended content, highlighting offbeat holidays like World Otter Day and suggesting games to play. That was too unfocused, so the July update pared back the recommended content. The update also polished features such as detailed document previews, making it easier to make sure you had the right file.

However, Microsoft’s upcoming Search update concluded that not enough people were clicking on the previews — were they supposed to? — so those rather nice-looking previews are disappearing, too.