Windows Insider
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A screenshot of the Fast Ring and Slow Ring Insider menu in the old Windows Phone 8.1 app
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| Original author(s) | Microsoft Corporation |
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| Initial release | October 1, 2014 |
| Development status | Active |
| Operating system | Windows 10, Windows 10 Mobile, Xbox One System Software |
| License | Proprietary software |
| Website | insider |
The Windows Insider program by Microsoft allows users who own a valid Windows 10 license to sign up for early builds of the operating system previously only accessible to developers. It was announced on September 30, 2014 along with Windows 10. By September 2015 over 7 million people took part in the Windows Insider Program. On February 12, 2015, Microsoft started to test out previews of Windows 10 Mobile. Microsoft announced that the Windows Insider program would continue beyond the official release of Windows 10 for future updates. Dona Sarkar is the head of the Windows Insider program. Similar to the Windows Insider program, the Microsoft Office, Bing and Xbox teams have set up their own Insider program.
Microsoft originally launched the Windows Insider program for enterprise testers and the "technically able" to test out new developer features and to gather feedback to improve the features built into Windows 10, and by the time of the official launch of the Windows 10 operating system for PCs a total of 5 million Windows Insiders were registered on both Windows 10 and Windows 10 Mobile and these Insiders were also among the first people to receive the official update to Windows 10.
With the release of Windows 10 the Windows Insider app was merged with the settings panel making it a built in component of Windows 10, this made the ability to install Windows Insider preview builds an optional feature which could be accessed directly from within the Windows 10 operating system without needing to install a separate app.
Windows 10 Insider preview updates are delivered to testers in different rings, Windows Insiders in the fast ring receive updates prior to Windows Insiders in the slow ring but might experience more bugs and other issues. In February 2016 Microsoft introduced new rings for the Windows Insider preview.
Microsoft initially launched the Windows 10 Insider Preview (formally known as Windows 10 Technical Preview) for certain third-generation (x30 series) phones from their Lumia family and subsequently released it to second-generation (x20 series) devices throughout the testing phase. After many Windows Insiders hacked their non-Lumia phones (which were not supported at the time) by altering what model was displayed in order to downloaded the preview builds, Microsoft responded by blocking all unsupported models. To roll back the installed technical preview back to Windows Phone 8.1 Microsoft launched the Windows Device Recovery Tool that will remove Windows 10 and recover the latest officially released software and firmware.
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