Windows 11 build 25300

Windows 11 build 25300 is the twelfth Insider Preview and the eleventh available client build of Zinc, the 23H2 development semester of Windows as a service. It was released to Windows Insiders in the Dev Channel on 15 February 2023.

Live captions
The live captions feature, initially introduced in build 22557, has been updated to support Chinese (Simplified and Traditional), French, German, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese (Brazil), Spanish and other English dialects.

File Explorer

 * A partially functional File Explorer based on Windows App SDK has been implemented. This change is hidden by default, but can be toggled on manually by the following steps:
 * Enable the ,   ,   , and    velocity IDs.
 * Take the ownership and then merge the following registry entry:


 * The Gallery page, initially implemented in build 25272, has been updated with a timeline scrollbar and the ability to add external library locations. These changes are disabled by default, but can be toggled on manually by enabling the Windows App SDK-based File Explorer and then enabling the   and    velocity IDs.

Shell

 * The following changes to snap layouts have been implmented and rolled out to a subset of users:
 * The hover time required to invoke the flyout when moving the mouse over the maximum/restore button in an app's title bar has been decreased. This change can be toggled on manually by enabling the  velocity ID with the   parameter set to 1 or 2.
 * The target app's icon and a descriptive title "Snap this window" have been added. These changes can be toggled on manually by enabling the  velocity ID with the   parameter set to 0 or 2.
 * The ability to display seconds in the system clock on the taskbar, previously disabled in build 25295, has been re-enabled.
 * The new "End task" option has been added to the app's context menu on the taskbar. This feature is disabled by default, but can be toggled on manually by enabling the  velocity ID.

Settings

 * The button control for startup app items under App > Startup, initially implemented in build 25247, has been rolled out to all users.
 * Right-clicking on a Win32 app in the Start menu and choosing "Uninstall" will be redirected to the Apps > Installed apps page.

Task Manager

 * Pressing ↓ while doing a search will move the keyboard focus from the search box into the results.
 * When the contrast theme is enabled and one of the rows in the Processes page is selected, that row will show that it's selected.

Miscellaneous
When upgrading to the new Windows Subsystem for Linux Store app, the system will prompt for installation if  is invoked.

General

 * Fixed the underlying issue related to  that was causing some apps that use   APIs (such as Notepad and Terminal) to crash when IME is enabled.
 * Fixed the issue that was causing graphical glitches in WinPE and WinRE.
 * Fixed an issue that was causing authentication issues for enterprise websites that require windows integrated authentication.

Shell

 * Fixed an issue that was causing taskbar to be cut off after resolution changes.
 * Fixed an issue where when hovering over app icons on the taskbar could switch window focus unexpectedly.
 * Fixed an issue where drag and dropping files and folders across File Explorer tabs wouldn't work properly.
 * Fixed an issue where Narrator's focus wasn't going back to the Quick Settings' window correctly when using the back button in the Cast page.

Widgets
Fixed an issue that was causing third-party widgets to get unpinned when signed in with a Microsoft account across multiple devices. As a result, some third-party widgets may be unpinned when upgrading to this build.

Input
Fixed an issue where the IME candidate window and IME toolbar weren't shown or cropped sometimes.

Task Manager

 * Fixed an issue that was causing process names typed into the search box to unexpectedly get spellchecked.
 * Fixed a couple of issues with how Narrator was reading out content in Task Manager.
 * Fixed an issue where the dropdowns in settings might not match your currently selected theme.
 * Fixed an issue that was causing search results to suddenly disappear when using search on the App History page.
 * Fixed an issue where if users open the Default Start Page dropdown in settings, clicking the Task Manager window wouldn't make the dropdown disappear.
 * Fixed an issue where ragging the window using the search box area wouldn't work.
 * Fixed an issue where ending processes in the Details tab wasn't showing a confirmation dialog.
 * Fixed an issue where increasing the text scaling would result in a "see more" button appearing with no contents.
 * Fixed an issue where focus might not get set properly to search, leading to Narrator not saying that focus was on the search box.

General

 * Some USB devices may not work after upgrading to this build.
 * Using Windows Hello to sign in with facial recognition may not work on certain ARM64 devices.
 * The system may take longer than expected to upgrade to this build in certain cases.
 * The "Getting ready for you" screens may appear for Azure Active Directory joined users when signing into Windows after upgrading to this build.
 * Users may experience issues authenticating to enterprise websites that require windows integrated authentication in certain cases.
 * The Administrative Templates error  may appear when opening Group Policy Editor.

Shell

 * The App icons on the taskbar may appear on the wrong monitor when using multiple monitors.
 * The New button in Snipping Tool may be broken.
 * Clicking on a secondary monitor may not dismiss the full screen experience if the new Spotlight UI is enabled.
 * The desktop icon arrangements may be re-aligned unexpectedly sometimes.
 * On some locales, the default font used in several UI elements (such as the date and time on the taskbar) may change to regular Segoe UI instead of Segoe UI Variable.
 * Enabling the timeline scrollbar in File Explorer's Gallery page may lead  to crash in certain circumstances.
 * The Microsoft Pinyin IME under the OOBE's keyboard selecting page may be duplicated in Simplified Chinese language.

Settings

 * The Language & Region page may indicate speech recognition support for currently unsupported languages.
 * When adding a language via the Language & Region page, the installation progress may become hidden, and users may not see install completion for enhanced speech recognition.
 * The Language & Region page may not offer the necessary speech recognition language support for live captions for up to an hour after first login.

Live captions

 * The enhanced speech recognition support may not be installed correctly through the Language & Region page in the Settings app on ARM64 devices.
 * The Live captions for Chinese Traditional may not work on ARM64 devices.
 * Captioning performance may be degraded in non-English languages and missing out-of-language filtering in non-English (United States) languages.

Widgets
Some third-party widgets may not load as expected sometimes.

Task Manager
The status of Startup apps in Task Manager may be reset to their default state after installing this build.

Safe mode

 * Quick Settings and date/time clock on the taskbar may be missing due to the  service not running.
 * Clicking Bluetooth & devices and Personalization pages may crash the Settings app due to an overrun of a stack-based buffer.