Up until now, if you wanted to get Windows 11 on your PC before its official release later this year, the only insider program for the new OS was the ‘dev channel’. Microsoft acknowledges this channel has some rough edges and stability problems, so it perhaps wasn’t the best idea to install this build on your primary PC. However, the company’s been busy ironing out the bugs reported in this channel, now opening up the beta channel for the latest preview build, which looks like it should offer a much smoother and more stable experience.
If you’ve already been using the dev channel to access early Windows 11 builds, Microsoft says “now would be the right time to consider switching to the beta Channel if you want to stay on more stabilised builds of Windows 11”.
There are many changes coming with this latest build, such as the removal of a bug that caused Windows Explorer to crash, UI improvements, and reworked animations in the Microsoft Store. Of course, being a beta, it’s worth noting that it’s still not entirely bug free, even if it’s a big improvement over the builds we saw in the dev channel.
Microsoft notes that some issues remain, such as the settings app sometimes crashing upon launch, and the widgets board sometimes remaining blank.
So, if you want a seamless experience, you should probably still keep Windows 10 on your rig until Windows 11’s official release later this year. If you still don’t want to upgrade then, Microsoft plans to support the older OS until 2025.