Tom Warren

Orion is now official

Phi-4-multimodal and Phi-4-mini are Microsoft’s latest small language models, both launching on Azure AI Foundry and Hugging Face today. Phi-4-multimodal improves speech recognition, translation, summarization, audio understanding, and image analysis. Phi-4-mini is designed for speed and efficiency situations, and both can be used by developers on smartphones, PCs, and cars. [Image: https://platform.theverge.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2025/02/phi4.png?quality=90&strip=all]

We might see GPT-4.5 in late February.

Researchers have spent 17 years working on this milestone.

Xbox studio Ninja Theory has helped develop the AI model.

Task switching just got easier on Outlook mobile

The scareware blocker is in preview now

Microsoft Build 2025 will be very focused on AI.

It’s no longer exclusive to Android.

It’s the latest attempt to get people to use Bing instead of Google.

Windows Insiders get access to a new Phone Link app today.

Microsoft has a new trick to try and get Chrome users over to Edge.

An improved third-party password manager experience arrives in November.

Google is acquiring software virtualization company Cameyo in a push to deeply integrate virtualized Windows app support into ChromeOS. Google was already working closely with Cameyo, and now it’s bringing this key virtualization expertise and technology in-house. Google partnered with Cameyo last year to deliver a virtual application experience for legacy Windows desktop apps that was integrated into ChromeOS. This included local file system integration, virtual apps as progressive web apps, a…

Microsoft will soon allow businesses and developers to build AI-powered Copilots that can work like virtual employees and perform tasks automatically. Instead of Copilot sitting idle waiting for queries, it will be able to do things like monitor email inboxes and automate a series of tasks or data entry that employees normally have to do manually. It’s a big change in the behavior of Copilot in what the industry commonly calls AI agents, or the ability for chatbots to intelligently perform comp…

Microsoft has committed changes to Chromium that will improve text rendering on Windows machines. Following years of complaints, Chrome version 124 will finally support contrast and gamma values from the Windows ClearType Text Tuner for text rendering in Google’s browser. This change should mean Chrome will finally match the improvements Microsoft made to Edge for font and text rendering, so you can apply text contrast enhancements and gamma correction to improve the readability of text on webp…

Microsoft is once again injecting pop-ups into Google’s Chrome browser in a bid to get people to switch to Bing. The software giant first introduced malware-like pop-up ads last year with a prompt that appeared over the top of other apps and windows. After pausing that notification to address “unintended behavior,” the pop-ups have returned again on Windows 10 and 11. Windows users have reported seeing the new pop-up in recent days, advertising Bing AI and Microsoft’s Bing search engine inside…

Microsoft has fixed an issue where its Edge browser was again misbehaving, this time by automatically importing browsing data and tabs from Chrome without consent. I personally experienced the bug last month, after I rebooted my PC for a regular Windows update and Microsoft Edge automatically opened with the Chrome tabs I was working on before the update. I asked Microsoft repeatedly to explain why this behavior had occurred for myself and many other Windows users, but the company refused to co…

Last week, I turned on my PC, installed a Windows update, and rebooted to find Microsoft Edge automatically open with the Chrome tabs I was working on before the update. I don’t use Microsoft Edge regularly, and I have Google Chrome set as my default browser. Bleary-eyed at 9AM, it took me a moment to realize that Microsoft Edge had simply taken over where I’d left off in Chrome. I couldn’t believe my eyes. I never imported my data into Microsoft Edge, nor did I confirm whether I wanted to impo…

Google appears to be readying a version of its popular Chrome browser for Windows on Arm. X (formerly Twitter) user Pedro Justo spotted a native version of the browser for Windows 11 Arm-powered devices in the latest nightly builds of Chrome in the Canary channel. Google’s release of a Chrome Canary version for Windows on Arm is a surprise, and we’ve reached out to the company to clarify when it plans to bring this to the stable channel. I have installed and tested the Canary version to verify…