Windows 11 build 25309

Windows 11 build 25309 is the thirteenth Insider Preview and the twelfth available client build of Zinc, the 23H2 development semester of Windows as a service. It was originally released to Windows Insiders in the Dev Channel on 2 March 2023. Following the revamp of the Windows Insider Program on 6 March 2023, the build has been pulled from the Dev Channel and was instead pushed to the new Canary Channel.
== New features and changes ==
=== File Explorer ===
* The File Explorer based on Windows App SDK, initially introduced in build 25300, has been rolled out to all users.
* When clicking the "Open in new tab" context menu option or middle-clicking folders, File Explorer will open a new tab in the background rather than switching focus.
=== Shell ===
* The redesigned Sound output page in the Quick Settings with new volume mixer feature, along with a new keyboard shortcut to open the page directly (), initially implemented in build 25281, have been rolled out to a subset of users. This feature can be toggled on manually by enabling the 42106010 velocity ID.
* The dot-style notification badge on the Start menu's user profile icon, initially introduced in build 25217, has been updated with different text variants. This change is only available to a subset of users.
* A lighter version of the search box on the taskbar has been added when Windows is set to dark mode.
* The new Windows Spotlight UI, previously re-introduced in build 25281, has been disabled by default.
* The support of showing the "Learn more about this picture" icon at different positions, initially implemented in build 25281, has been rolled out to all users.
* The second-chance out of box experience (SCOOBE) screen has been updated in a more personalized way.
* The ability to show recommendations for tips, shortcuts and new apps in Start menu (configurable via Personalization > Start in the Settings app) has been added. This feature is disabled by default, but can be toggled on manually by enabling the 42916428 velocity ID.
=== Widgets ===
The theme-aware icons for the Widgets entry point on the taskbar based on the user's Windows theme has been added.
=== Settings ===
* The new touch keyboard dropdown menu under Time & language > Typing, initially implemented in build 25188 and later disabled by default in build 25217, has been re-enabled and re-rolled out to a subset of users. This feature can be toggled on manually by enabling the 37007953 velocity ID.
* The new "Automatically manage color for apps" option under Display > Advanced display, initially implemented in build 25262, has been rolled out to a subset of users. This feature can be toggled on manually by enabling the 41740192 velocity ID.
* A new "Power button controls" option for changing the behavior when interacting with the device's physical power controls has been added under System > Power & Battery.
* A comfirmation prompt will appear when turning off location services under Privacy & security > Location.
=== Voice access ===
The following changes have been added to Voice access:
* Redesigned in-app help page.
* The ability to support English dialects other than American English.
* New text selection and editing commands.
=== Input ===
The performance and accuracy of Simplified Chinese handwriting recognition engine have been improved, and the support of characters defined in GB18030-2022 has been added.
=== Miscellaneous ===
VBScript is now an optional feature and can be uninstalled.
=== Bugfixes ===
==== General ====
* Fixed an issue that was causing USB devices (including keyboard and mouse) to not work after upgrading to previous Zinc builds.
* Fixed an issue that was causing the Start menu and taskbar to cyclically crash if users had uninstalled the previous Zinc builds.
* Fixed an issue where using Windows Hello to sign in with facial recognition won't work on certain ARM64 devices.
* Fixed multiple issues that were preventing some of the new live captions language models from downloading correctly.
* Fixed an underlying issue that was causing certain ARM64 devices to not be able to activate M365, with it citing a network issue.
* Fixed a search indexer crash.
* Fixed an underlying issue that could cause UWP apps to appear in English after upgrading although that wasn't the current display language.
* Fixed an issue which was causing .appinstaller packages to fail to install with an error message that says "The parameter is incorrect."
* Fixed an underlying issue causing certain cameras to not work in apps.
* Fixed an underlying issue which was leading to Microsoft Edge crashes.
==== File Explorer ====
* Fixed an issue that was causing custom desktop icon arrangements / sizes to get set back to default in build 25300.
* Fixed an underlying issue believed to be the cause of File Explorer unexpectedly jumping into the foreground sometimes.
* Fixed an issue where the close button could get stuck in a highlighted state when moving the mouse across it.
==== Shell ====
* Fixed multiple explorer.exe crashes that were impacting taskbar and system tray.
* Fixed a display issue that was resulting in the taskbar appearing duplicated when making resolution changes.
* Fixed an issue that was causing app icons on the taskbar to appear on the wrong monitor.
* Fixed rendering issues when using the touch keyboard with the search box on the taskbar.
* Fixed an issue where when double-clicking the search highlight glyph in the search box makes it disappear.
* Fixed an issue that was causing the search box on the taskbar to randomly disappear.
* Fixed an issue that was causing the search icon on the taskbar to flip incorrectly for right-to-left languages.
* Fixed an issue that was causing some text flicker in the search box on the taskbar when clicking into it.
* Fixed an issue that was causing the search box on the taskbar to disappear on one monitor when using multiple monitors.
* Fixed a high hitting DWM crash in the last couple Zinc builds.
==== Settings ====
* Fixed an issue that was causing Windows Update > Windows Insider Program page to show a newer build was available in Windows Update even though Windows is currently the latest available Zinc build.
* Some accessibility fixes to the settings for search under Personalization > Taskbar have been made.
* Fixed an underlying issue that was causing the settings under Apps > Startup to get reset.
* Fixed an issue that was causing the Settings app to crash when opening Privacy & Security > Phone Calls.
==== Widgets ====
Fixed an issue where that was causing third-party widgets to not load as expected under certain circumstances.
==== Input ====
* Fixed an issue where when using the French-Canadian layout for the touch keyboard, the letters output when typing didn't always match what was displayed on the keys.
* Fixed an issue where when using the Korean IME, pressing would open the IME context menu.
== Bugs and quirks ==
=== General ===
* 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.
* The Administrative Templates error Resource '$(LetAppsAccessHumanPresence_Name)' referenced in attribute displayName could not be found. may appear when opening Group Policy Editor.
* If attempting to format a ReFS volume with /devvol, the user may need to omit the /q parameter. Otherwise, the file system may not be recognized.
=== Shell ===
* The New button in Snipping Tool may be broken. The key combination will still work.
* 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.
=== 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.
* Captioning performance may be degraded in non-English languages and missing out-of-language filtering in non-English (United States) languages.
=== Voice access ===
The redesigned in-app help page in voice access may not include all commands and the supplementary information may be inaccurate.
=== Safe mode ===
* Quick Settings and date/time clock on the taskbar may be missing due to the Capability Access Manager Service service not running.
* Clicking Bluetooth & devices and Personalization pages may crash the Settings app due to an overrun of a stack-based buffer 0xc0000409.
== Gallery ==
File:Win11-boot-10x-anim.png|Boot screen
File:Windows11-10.0.25300.1000-FileExplorer.webp|The Windows App SDK-based File Explorer
File:Windows11-10.0.25309.1000-QuickSettings.webp|The new Sound output page in the Quick Settings
File:Windows11-10.0.25309.1000-Settings1.webp|The Power page in the Settings app
File:Windows11-10.0.25309.1000-Settings2.webp|The Start page in the Settings app
== External links ==
* Official announcement
Category:Windows 11 builds
Category:Zinc builds