At Xbox, October transforms into Shocktober Oct. 16 – Nov. 2. Boo! Spooky season ushers in the return of this annual event, which includes sales on games, like Little Nightmares III Deluxe Edition, as well as in-game jumpscares and themes in popular titles such as Fortnite (Fortnitemares 2025!). Players will also see new additions on Xbox Game Pass like The Casting of Frank Stone. 

Microsoft and LSEG are teaming up to make financial data easier to use. The two companies announced a collaboration that allows finance pros to use AI agents built in Microsoft Copilot Studio and deployed in Microsoft 365 Copilot to analyze secure LSEG data, helping them access insights faster and bring market intelligence into everyday workflows. Read more about the multiyear partnership here. 

A new report about AI enthusiasts – a growing group of users who integrate AI into their daily lives – takes a look at what sets them apart and how others can learn from them. Two things make a big difference: personalized AI that adapts to them and knowing where the answers come from. The enthusiasts are also willing to engage and act as AI-powered tools become more intuitive. 

The enterprise AI revolution will be led by humans — specifically, developers, according to Microsoft’s Amanda Silver. In a Q&A, she says developers are the real leaders of the AI revolution, coding their way through workflows, copilots and responsible scale. Read more about how Microsoft’s stack puts devs in the driver’s seat. 

A Barcelona soccer club has been testing whether AI can help underdogs win. With help from a startup and some international students, Europa’s women’s team is using data-driven insights to bounce back from relegation — a low-budget experiment in whether machine learning can deliver Moneyball-style gains without giant resources. Read the full story from Signal magazine.  

A new Microsoft initiative will offer free access to advanced AI tools and training for all high school and community college students in Washington state. Elevate Washington will give more than half a million students and 100,000 educators the technology and skills they need to thrive in the AI era.  

The design team of Windows 11 is rethinking how people engage with their PCs and is favoring calm over clutter. Light guides focus, motion softens transitions, and every detail is tuned to support attention, not steal it. Read more about the intuitive and responsive design here. 

Microsoft is announcing a new type of powerful virtual machine called NDv6 GB300. Built with advanced NVIDIA graphics chips and connected by a superfast, next-generation XDR–InfiniBand network, the virtual machines will enable AI model training in days instead of weeks. This first cluster is just the beginning – soon Microsoft will scale up to hundreds of thousands of GB300 GPUs in datacenters around the world. Read more here.  

From the inventors of Python and RSS feeds to the creators of Google Docs and Lens, some familiar names — and plenty of unsung innovators — are working together at Microsoft to shape how AI can help us all. Their journeys show how fresh perspectives, deep experience and a commitment to responsible technology are driving new ideas and practical solutions for developers, business and anyone looking for smarter ways to work and live. 

Australia’s Head Start Homes empowers people living in subsidized housing to become first-time homeowners. The nonprofit does that with a ground–breaking model that acts as a loan guarantor for clients, which removes the need for a down payment that can make home ownership impossible – all with a little help from AI. 

Rural hospitals often have limited staff to deal with complex insurance billing, leading to lost revenue that threatens their survival. A new, free AI tool co-developed with Microsoft is helping them resolve denied claims more efficiently and get reimbursed for their services faster. See how tech is helping small hospitals in underserved communities stay financially strong. 

Security threats are getting trickier, so Microsoft created easy-to-follow guides to help developers build safer software from the start. These patterns and practices offer practical ways to spot risks early, avoid common mistakes and strengthen defenses, making it easier for teams to protect people without deep security expertise. 

Azure AI Foundry just hit the turbo button: new OpenAI models for image, audio and real-time AI, plus a GPT-5 safety boost. Toss in Microsoft’s Agent Framework and multi-agent workflows, and devs now have a full-stack sandbox to build smarter and faster. Multimodal isn’t a buzzword — it’s your new playground. Launch starts Oct. 7. 

Inclusion isn’t a side quest — it’s the main storyline! Xbox and Special Olympics are back with Gaming for Inclusion 2025 — featuring everything from Rocket League to celebrity cameos. Tune in on Oct. 14 at 10 a.m. PT on Twitch. 

Proteins are the engines and building blocks of biology — powering how organisms adapt, think and function. AI is helping scientists design new protein structures from amino acid sequences, opening doors to new therapies and cures.

But with that power also comes serious responsibility: Many of these tools are open source and could be susceptible to misuse. Learn how Microsoft scientists discovered a blind spot in biosecurity and worked to address the problem.

To celebrate 50 years, Microsoft dropped a nostalgia bomb: limited edition Crocs inspired by Windows XP. Think Bliss-themed backpacks, custom charms and clogs that channel the iconic green hill and blue sky. It’s a retro flex you can win via Instagram — because nothing says legacy like XP on your feet. 

Azure AI Foundry just rolled out new tools to help developers manage the growing complexity of multi-agent systems. As agentic AI scales up, so do the headaches — fragmented tooling, unreliable behavior, trust gaps. Today’s updates aim to fix that, giving developers sharper control and organizations a clearer path to responsible deployment. Read more here. 

Xbox Game Pass is splitting into three tiers — Ultimate, Premium and Essential — designed to match how players actually play. Ultimate adds perks like Fortnite Crew and Ubisoft+ Classics. Premium expands the library and PC access. Essential keeps it lean with 50+ games and multiplayer. It’s a shift that trades one-size-fits-all for choose-your-own-adventure.

Microsoft Chairman and CEO Satya Nadella named Judson Althoff CEO of the company’s commercial business bringing together sales, marketing, and operations in tight alignment with product engineering. This will enable the company to grow its at-scale commercial business, while advancing AI innovation with executional excellence. Read Nadella’s email to employees.

Minecraft’s Copper Age is here! Smelt your way to copper tools, armor and decor — plus a charming copper golem with built-in storage and sorting skills. Complete the Copper Cape Quest to earn your oxidized flair. It’s shiny, it’s mechanical and it’s live now to play for free in Bedrock and Java.

The latest Windows 11 update is now available, providing you with the latest features, security improvements and control.  This version of Windows 11 (known as Version 25H2) is being made available via a controlled feature rollout for eligible devices. Read the blog post and watch the video to find out more.

Tired of talking to a faceless AI? Meet Copilot Portraits: a batch of animated faces that talk back and make your AI assistant less robotic and more natural. Portraits are now available to users 18 years or older in Canada, the U.K. and the U.S. through Copilot Labs.

Microsoft’s security platform just got agentic. Sentinel now maps relationships between users, devices, apps and threats — so defenders can trace attack paths, spot patterns, and respond quickly. It also has customizable Copilot agents, allowing defenders to automate their triage with no code required.

Happy 40th birthday to Excel! The application is celebrating four decades of spreadsheets today. In its lifetime, Excel has developed a fandom that’s anything but formulaic — from esports in a Vegas stadium to NFL gameday insights. Even though Excel starts as a simple grid, in practice, it’s become a launchpad for so much more. Read about some of the most fun use cases for the application here.  

From vibe coding to vibe working — Microsoft 365 Copilot now brings Agent Mode and Office Agent to the party. Agent Mode tackles tasks in Excel and Word, from data analysis to feedback summaries. Office Agent, meanwhile, turns your Copilot prompts into crisp, presentation-ready decks and documents without you breaking a sweat. 

A new AI agent in Microsoft 365 Copilot is like having a super-efficient assistant built into your everyday tools, helping you do more and save time. Researcher can analyze mountains of data to give you insightful expertise in minutes, whether you’re preparing for a big meeting or brainstorming new product ideas. Learn more about what it can do for you.

Microsoft Marketplace is now one sleek destination for cloud solutions and AI apps and agents — thousands of them, ready to deploy and built to play nice with your Microsoft stack. Faster setup, smarter integration and a catalog that covers everything from analytics to agents. It’s now live in the United States, with a global rollout on the way. 

Windows ML lets developers build AI workloads right on the device, making AI experiences more responsive, private and cost-effective, reaching users across the broadest range of Windows hardware. Introduced at Build 2025, Windows ML is now generally available. 

Microsoft 365 Copilot now supports Anthropic’s Claude models alongside OpenAI’s, giving users more flexibility for deep reasoning and agent creation. Whether you’re using Researcher or building in Copilot Studio, you can mix and match models to suit your workflow — no platform-hopping required.

The chips powering today’s AI breakthroughs run hotter than ever, outpacing previous generations of silicon. To cool things down, Microsoft is testing a new microfluidics system that skips the cold plates and sends liquid coolant straight into the silicon — right where the heat is. Read more about how.