Articles about Microsoft account

The drum heralding the end of support for Windows 10 has been beaten almost to death, but even at this late stage there is more news about the death of the operating system.

With the mid-October date for mainstream support fast-approaching, there are still plenty of people using Windows 10. Some have opted to take up Microsoft on its last-minute offer of extended support – but a new catch has just been revealed.

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It is a year since Microsoft embraced passkeys for user accounts, and now the company is taking things further. With passkeys having been conceived as a replacement for passwords, any newly created Microsoft account will be passwordless.

This is not just a change that is about improving security (passwords having been shown time and time again to be highly fallible), but also user experience. The passkey-by-default approach now being adopted is part of a streamlining of UX for sign-ins.

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The next time you sign into your Microsoft account you may well be greeted by a new look. Microsoft has started the roll out of what it is calling a “new sign in experience” as the company uses its Fluent 2 design language to revamp the UI and UX. For better or worse, this is an attempt to create an “unmistakably Microsoft” look and feel.

The changes affect users of Windows, Xbox, Microsoft 365, and more, and Microsoft predicts that the majority of users will see the new look by the end of April. As part of the redesign, users are being given more choice; there is now a dark mode option.

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Microsoft has quietly announced a significant change to the sign in/out process for Microsoft accounts. The change could have massive security implications for many people.

As of next month, when you sign into your Microsoft account, you will remain signed in until you opt to sign out manually. At the moment the (arguably more secure) approach sees users signed out automatically after a period of inactivity, helping to protect anyone using a public computer.

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Chromebooks are only for business and general use computing, right? I mean, you can't do gaming on a Chromebook, right? Actually, these days, you absolutely can play some video games on Google's ChromeOS laptops. Case in point, today, the search giant announces that one of the most popular games of all time, Minecraft, is now officially available for Chromebooks!

Users can now purchase Minecraft: Bedrock Edition directly from the Google Play Store on their Chromebooks. This version includes access to the Minecraft Marketplace, where players can explore and acquire unique content, as well as the ability to join Realms and play with friends.

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If you're using Windows 11, there is a reasonable chance that you have a Microsoft account -- but it is not necessarily the case. While there are various advantages to signing into Windows using your Microsoft account, it is not something everyone feels entirely comfortable with.

So it will come as bad news to such hold-outs that Microsoft is going to force some users to create such an account. The change is coming to Window 11 Pro, meaning that home users who have opted for this version of Windows, in addition to the organizations, businesses and enterprises that use this edition of the operating system are affected. But there is some good news.

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If you have ever had to change a setting in your Microsoft 365 account, you'll possibly have been irritated by the fact that you have to do so in your browser rather than in Windows. But this is changing.

Last week, Microsoft released Windows 11 Build 22000.466 (KB5008353) to Windows Insiders signed up for the Beta and Release Preview channels. What many people -- including us! -- failed to notice in the changelog, or in the build itself, was an important change to the Settings app that means it is now possible to view and change options relating to your Microsoft account.

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The release of Windows 11 is still a number of months away, and we're still learning a lot about Microsoft's latest operating system update. In addition to the confusion about hardware requirements, there have been questions about other necessities.

According to sources close to Microsoft, anyone opting for Windows 11 Home will be required to have a Microsoft account. The same is not true for Windows 11 Pro; users will be able to use local accounts if they want.

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