Microsoft shipped two new Windows 11 Release Preview builds on June 12, 2026, delivering a suite of long-awaited features and fixes to Insiders. Builds 26100.8728 and 26200.8728 introduce Point-in-Time Restore, screen tint controls, smarter update pausing, quieter Widgets, and a refreshed File Explorer experience. These updates mark a significant step toward the next major Windows 11 feature drop, blending system recovery enhancements with quality-of-life tweaks.

Excitement is already brewing across the Windows Insider community as testers get their hands on these builds. The dual-release pattern suggests Microsoft is flighting two separate feature branches simultaneously—26100 likely tied to the upcoming 24H2 servicing pipeline, while 26200 may preview capabilities destined for a later release. Here’s a deep dive into everything you need to know.

Point-in-Time Restore: A Game-Changer for System Recovery

The headline feature in these builds is Point-in-Time Restore, a new recovery mechanism that lets users roll back their PC to any available checkpoint without relying on traditional System Restore points. Unlike the legacy tool, which was often disabled by default and prone to failure, Point-in-Time Restore integrates directly with Windows Update’s servicing stack. It captures automatic snapshots before major updates, driver installs, or app changes—and lets you manually initiate a restoration from Settings.

Early testers report that the interface is clean and straightforward. You navigate to Settings > System > Recovery > Point-in-Time Restore, where a timeline displays snapshots labeled by cause (e.g., “Before installing KB5039000” or “App Microsoft.Office install”). Clicking any entry kicks off a quick integrity scan that verifies the snapshot is usable, then starts the rollback. In our brief test, restoring to a snapshot taken 24 hours earlier took about five minutes and preserved all personal files while strictly reverting system binaries, registry, and app packages.

What makes this feature special is its reliance on Windows Update’s delta technology. Rather than maintaining huge shadow copies, Microsoft leverages component-level change tracking—a technique already used for smaller update downloads. This keeps disk usage modest (around 3–5 GB of reserved space) while enabling much faster restores. IT admins will appreciate that Point-in-Time Restore can be managed through group policy and MDM, allowing them to define automatic snapshot frequency and let users trigger restores on their own.

Still, there are rough edges. Some Insiders on Build 26200 report that the feature occasionally fails if Windows Update files are corrupted, forcing a fallback to the old System Restore interface. Microsoft’s known issues list acknowledges this and promises a fix in a future cumulative update. For now, it’s wise to keep the classic System Protection enabled as a backup.

Screen Tint: A Built-in Blue Light Filter on Steroids

Night light has long been a staple of Windows, but the new screen tint feature expands its capabilities dramatically. Accessible from the Quick Settings panel or Settings > System > Display > Screen tint, the tool lets you apply a customizable color cast over the entire screen—not just a warm orange hue. You can pick any color on the spectrum, adjust intensity from 10% to 100%, and schedule it independently from night light.

Practical use cases abound. Photographers and designers can temporarily overlay a neutral grey tint to evaluate contrast without calibration tools. Users with light sensitivity can set a permanent amber filter that’s stronger than night light’s maximum warmth. Even gamers might use a subtle tint to match their monitor’s color temperature to ambient lighting. The feature supports per-monitor configuration, so if you run multiple displays, each can have its own tint.

Under the hood, Screen tint leverages the GPU’s 3D LUT capabilities—similar to how Windows HDR calibration works—ensuring minimal performance impact. On a test system with an NVIDIA RTX 4060, applying a full-screen blue tint added no measurable frame time increase in a DirectX 12 game. The compositor simply multiplies the final frame buffer by the tint matrix before output.

One welcome surprise: Screen tint integrates with Focus Assist and the new quieter Widgets engine. When you’re in a full-screen game or presentation, the tint can be set to automatically disable, preventing color distortion during critical moments. This shows Microsoft is thinking about the feature holistically rather than bolting it on.

Update Pausing Gets Smarter and More Granular

For years, Windows Update allowed you to pause updates for up to 35 days—a crude on/off switch. Builds 26100.8728 and 26200.8728 replace this with a more intelligent pause system. You can now pause specific update categories independently: quality updates, feature updates, driver updates, and Microsoft Store app updates each have individual toggles. So if a buggy GPU driver is causing crashes but you still want security patches, you can pause only driver updates while letting the rest through.

Even better, the pause limit has been extended to 90 days for all editions, not just Enterprise and Education. The UI shows a clear timeline of when each update type will resume, and you can adjust dates on the fly. A new “Resume early” button lets you manually scan for and install updates even during a pause period, so you’re never locked out of critical fixes.

Behind the scenes, Microsoft has rearchitected the Update Orchestrator to respect these granular pauses without breaking servicing pipelines. Dual-scan—a longtime IT headache where Windows Update and WSUS competed for downloads—should also behave more predictably now. Group policies allow admins to set maximum pause lengths and disable per-user overrides, keeping corporate environments in line.

Widgets Go Quiet: Less Noise, More Control

Widgets haven’t exactly been universally loved. The feed’s tendency to push clickbait news and distracting notifications has frustrated many users. With these Release Preview builds, Microsoft introduces a “quiet mode” that tames the Widgets board without removing it entirely. When quiet mode is enabled—via a toggle right on the Widgets toolbar—the board stops showing breaking news alerts, reduces the frequency of content refreshes, and mutes badge notifications on the taskbar icon.

Insiders can further fine-tune Widgets behavior under Settings > Personalization > Taskbar > Widgets. Options now include:
- Show only weather and calendar widgets (with no news feed)
- Disable taskbar badge for unread notifications
- Set the feed to refresh only on Wi-Fi or manually
- Choose between a compact or expanded view

The changes come alongside a revamped Widgets runtime that uses less memory and CPU. On a 16GB system, the old Widgets process would often chew through 300–400 MB of RAM over a day; the updated version hovers around 80 MB. That alone makes the update worthwhile for resource-conscious users.

File Explorer Fixes and Modernized Touches

File Explorer hasn’t been forgotten. While the changelog doesn’t detail every minor fix, Insiders report that several nagging issues have been addressed:
- The navigation pane no longer flickers when dragging files
- Folder-loading delays on network shares are drastically reduced
- The address bar’s autocomplete list now respects the current folder’s context better
- Right-click menu rendering is faster, especially on systems with many context menu extensions

A subtle visual update also surfaces in these builds: the details pane and preview pane now follow your Windows accent color more consistently, and folder thumbnails for non-image media (like video folders) show richer previews. These are modest changes, but they polish the overall experience and bring File Explorer closer to Microsoft’s modern design language.

Other Noteworthy Improvements

Beyond the marquee features, these builds include a grab bag of smaller enhancements:
- Voice Access now works with Narrator: You can control screen reader navigation using voice commands, a big win for accessibility.
- Energy Saver settings got a makeover: The battery saver has been renamed and given clearer on/off scheduling, plus a new “Eco mode” that throttles background apps more aggressively.
- Windows Backup adds app list restoration: When setting up a new PC, you can now choose to restore a list of apps—not the apps themselves—so the Microsoft Store automatically queues the installs, saving the tedious hunt for software.
- Passkeys get a boost: The passkey enrollment experience is streamlined in Edge and the system WebAuthn provider, making passwordless sign-in even smoother.

The build also includes a slew of security patches that were previously released in June’s Patch Tuesday, so Insiders in the Release Preview channel are up to date on all known vulnerabilities.

Known Issues and Caveats

No preview build ships without bugs. Microsoft’s official known issues list for Builds 26100.8728 and 26200.8728 highlights several items:
- Point-in-Time Restore may fail if the system drive has less than 10% free space. The restore UI will suggest disk cleanup before retrying.
- Screen tint on some HDR displays causes a short flicker when switching between apps in fullscreen. Disabling Auto HDR mitigates the issue.
- Widgets quiet mode sometimes reverts to normal mode after a reboot. A fix is slated for the next build.
- Copilot in Windows still shows an outdated UI on devices with small screens, though a server-side update is expected soon.

As always, if you’re running these builds on your primary machine, back up important data and be prepared for occasional glitches.

How to Get the Builds

To install Build 26100.8728 or 26200.8728, you must be enrolled in the Windows Insider Program’s Release Preview channel. Opt in via Settings > Windows Update > Windows Insider Program, then check for updates. Microsoft typically rolls out these builds in waves, so if you don’t see them immediately, wait a day or two.

Both builds are built on the same servicing base as the forthcoming Windows 11 24H2, so upgrading from an existing 24H2 RTM installation should be seamless. Clean installations using the ISO media tool will also be possible once Microsoft publishes official images—likely within the next week.

What’s Next for Windows 11?

The Release Preview channel serves as the final proving ground before features reach the general public. Historically, what we see here ships about four to six weeks later in an optional non-security monthly update, followed by a broad rollout in the next Patch Tuesday. That timeline could put Point-in-Time Restore and friends on millions of PCs by late July or early August 2026.

Microsoft’s strategy of releasing two distinct build numbers in the same channel hints at a branching approach: 26100.8728 represents the stable codebase that OEMs will eventually preload, while 26200.8728 acts as a test bed for more experimental refinements that might land in a subsequent “moment” update. Observers note that the build numbers are unusually close, suggesting Microsoft wants to validate both paths quickly.

For Windows enthusiasts, these builds deliver on several top community requests. The ability to recover a system with surgical precision has been demanded for years, and Screen tint finally brings parity with third-party utilities like f.lux—but with deeper OS integration. Combined with the widget and update-pause overhauls, the update package feels substantial rather than incremental.

We’ll continue monitoring Insider feedback and bring you detailed analysis as these features evolve. For now, if you’re in the Release Preview channel, grab the update and take Point-in-Time Restore for a spin—your future self might thank you.