Windows 10 build 17661 is now available for Insider members. The latest insider build comes with a big list of new features and improvements. The new modern snipping experience is here to help you effortlessly capture and annotate what you see on your screen. In addition, Windows Defender Security Center is now called Windows Security. You can still get to the app in all the usual ways – simply ask Cortana to open Windows Security or interact with the taskbar icon. Check out more details below. Also, Windows 10 build 17661 ISO download links will be available later.

Update: Windows 10 Build 17661 ISOs are now available.

What’s New in Windows 10 Build 17661

A modern snipping experience

Screen Sketch is now an app! Originally introduced as part of the Windows Ink Workspace, this comes with a variety of benefits, including that it can now be updated via the Microsoft Store, it will now show up in the list when you press Alt + tab, you can set the window size to be your preference if you like multitasking, and it even supports multiple windows (and tabs, thanks to Sets!).

Easy snipping is only a single step away. WIN + Shift + S will now bring up a snipping toolbar – snip a rectangle, something a bit more freeform, or full screen and it will go straight to your clipboard. If that’s all you need, you can take it from there. Want more, though? Immediately after taking a snip you’ll now get a notification that will take you and your snip to the Screen Sketch app where you can annotate and share away!

Just click the pen tail button. If you have a pen, go into Pen & Windows Ink Settings – you’ll find Screen Snipping is now an option for single click. This will launch you directly into our snipping experience:

• Press Print Screen. Go to Keyboard Settings – you’ll see a new option that says “Use the Print Screen key to launch screen snipping”. Opening Settings and searching for “print screen” will take you to the right page.
• Press the quick action button in Action Center. Called “Screen snip” – it should be there as soon as you upgrade, but if not you can always enable it via Notifications & Actions Settings.

More Fluent Design: Introducing acrylic in Task View

With Windows 10 build 17661 you’ll find that the entire Task View background now has a soft blur effect.

Windows Security improvements

Windows Defender Security Center is now called Windows Security. You can still get to the app in all the usual ways – simply ask Cortana to open Windows Security or interact with the taskbar icon. Windows Security lets you manage all your security needs, including Windows Defender Antivirus and Windows Defender Firewall.

Windows 10 build 17661 also bringing some changes to how we present threats and actions that need your attention, and we’re continuing to refine that over the coming months.

Focus assist improvements when gaming

Now Focus assist will turn on automatically when you’re playing any full screen game. No more interruptions when you’re crushing it. This behavior should be turned on automatically, but you can always check by going to Settings > System > Focus assist and ensuring the “When I’m playing a game” automatic rule is enabled.

Continuing our Sound Settings migration

Device properties has now been integrated into Settings – just click on the links in Sound Settings and you’ll find a new page where you can name your device and select your preferred spatial audio format.

Taking the Microsoft Pinyin and Wubi IMEs to the next level

Do you write in Chinese (Simplified)? Windows 10 build 17661 updating the Microsoft Pinyin IME! We’ve been focusing on addressing your performance, reliability and compatibility feedback.

An updated context menu. We’ve added a bunch of options to the IME mode indicator’s context menu in the taskbar, so you can quickly access the things you need.

The IME now uses the same UX for Expressive Input as other languages. You can bring it up by clicking the emoji button in the IME toolbar, or use the Emoji Panel hotkeys (WIN + period (.) or WIN + semicolon (;)). You can browse between Emoji, Kaomoji, and Symbol input when Chinese (Simplified) is the active locale.

Improving HEIC support

With build 17661 you can now rotate HEIF-format images in File Explorer, and edit metadata, such as “Date taken”.

The new functionality requires the latest version of the HEIF package. The latest version will be installed automatically be the Store.

HEIF files use the HEVC video codec to compress the image into approximately half the size of JPEG. If your Windows PC does not already have the HEVC video codec, it can be purchased from the Windows Store using this link.

To rotate a HEIF image file, simply right-click on it in File Explorer and select “Rotate right” or “Rotate left” from the menu. “Date taken” and other properties can be edited by clicking on “Properties” and selecting the “Details” tab.

Fixed in Windows 10 Build 17661

• Windows 10 build 17661 made a number of improvements to how Narrator communicates the use of Sets – for example, Narrator will now inform you of the tabs by reading information such as Tab # N of M as you open and move between tabs. If you’re a Narrator user, please take a moment to try out Sets with today’s build and share feedback about the experience.
• When you clean install or do a PC refresh, you’ll find that the Out of Box Experience for setting up your PC now includes a page for enabling activity history sync, which will help you continue what you were doing, even when you switch devices.
• Windows 10 build 17661 adjusted how you access skin tones in the Emoji Panel – you’ll now see a row of skin tone colors to select from when people emoji are in view.
• Fixed an issue where using arrow and Page Up / Page Down keys didn’t work to scroll webpages in Microsoft Edge.
• Windows 10 build 17661 fixed an issue resulting in the mouse cursor becoming invisible when hovering over certain UI elements and text fields in the last two flights.
• Fixed an issue resulting in the mouse cursor not animating correctly in the last two flights.
• We fixed an issue resulting in the Game Bar not appearing for some Insiders after pressing WIN+G.
• When you hover over the Windows icon in the taskbar, a tooltip will now appear for Start.
• Windows 10 build 17661 updated the design of the handwriting panel so that the delete button is now a top level button. The button to switch languages is now under the “…” menu.
• If you go to Pen & Windows Ink Settings, you’ll find a new option that allows your pen to behave like a mouse instead of scrolling or panning the screen.

Known Issues in Windows 10 Build 17661

• Certain notifications from Action Center may cause regular Explorer.exe crashes. We’re working to get this fixed in the next flight.
• VPN may not be working after updating to this build. To get VPN working again, delete the %ProgramData%\Microsoft\Network\Connections\pbk* directories. Check if the VPN profile you need shows up already and if not, reinstall the appropriate VPN client app you need.
• After updating to this build and installing the latest app updates from the Microsoft Store, when you log in to additional user accounts on the PC there may be missing apps. You can run the following PowerShell script when logged in to users with missing apps on your PC to fix the issue: Get-AppXPackage *WindowsStore* -AllUsers | Foreach {Add-AppxPackage -DisableDevelopmentMode -Register “$($_.InstallLocation)\AppXManifest.xml”}
• On resuming from sleep, the desktop may be momentarily visible before the Lock screen displays as expected.
• When Movies & TV user denies access to its videos library (through the “Let Movies & TV access your videos library?” popup window or through Windows privacy settings), Movies & TV crashes when the user navigates to the “Personal” tab.
• We’re aware of an issue that causes Narrator to read extra text when invoking Alt + Tab, and we’re working on a fix.
• If you complete the setup for a Windows Mixed Reality headset on this build, the headset will remain black until it is unplugged and reconnected to the PC.
• Sets UX for Office Win32 desktop apps is not final.  The experience will be refined over time based on feedback.
• The top of some Win32 desktop app windows may appear slightly underneath the tab bar when created maximized. To work around the issue, restore and re-maximize the window.
• Closing one tab may sometimes minimize the entire set.
• Tiling and cascading windows, including features like “View Side by Side” in Word, will not work for inactive tabs.
• The Office Visual Basic Editor window will currently be tabbed but is not intended to be in the future.
• Opening an Office document while the same app has an existing document open may cause an unintended switch to the last active document. This will also happen when closing a sheet in Excel while other sheets remain open.
• Right-clicking a tab in Sets will not bring up a context menu in this build.
• Local files or non-Microsoft cloud files will not be automatically restored, and no error message will be provided to alert the user to that fact.