Microsoft confirms second major Windows 10 update coming in 2017

There's a second major Windows 10 update coming later in 2017, Microsoft has confirmed. The second update, code-named Redstone 3, will follow sometime after the putative April release of the Windows 10 Creators Update.

This new update was revealed at Microsoft Ignite in Australia via a "Windows 10 release cadence" slide, pictured below. The purple sections show the few months where an update is available via the Windows Insider programme, and then the plus sign indicates mainstream release. Teal indicates the period where enterprise customers "pilot" the new update, and dark blue is the "production" period where Microsoft provides active support. So, you can see that Microsoft plans to support two versions of Windows 10 concurrently before moving onto the next update.

Judging by that slide, then, the new Windows 10 update should be available to Windows Insiders in April/May, and then released to the public in November.

Other details are scant, though. We don't yet have a name for the release, other than its Redstone 3 code name, nor what features the update might contain. Project Neon, the next iteration of Microsoft's Windows design language, could be ready by then. From what we've seen so far, Neon retains the clean lines, flatness, and focus on typography first introduced by Metro, but adds a soupçon of excitement in the form of new animations and additional translucency. The gallery at the top of the story has some images and animations from an early version of Windows 10 Neon.

We might hear a little more about the next Windows 10 update and Project Neon in the next few weeks, but the main infodump will likely come at Microsoft's Build developer conference in May, following the mainstream release of the Creators Update.

Listing image by MSPoweruser