Windows 11's Copilot AI might take over your desktop in the future - if you want it to

Currently, Microsoft's Copilot AI sits in a side-bar in Windows 11, though it's a fairly slim panel - but you'll be able to make it a lot bigger in the future, should you wish.

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The release version of Windows 11 now has Copilot, at least in some regions (Image Credit: Microsoft)

According to Windows Latest, the ability to expand Copilot's panel is being tried out in preview versions of Windows 11 right now.

You might want a bigger area to interact with the AI if you're going to engage in a deeper, lengthier, session of queries, and if that's the case, the new ability simply allows you to drag out the panel to the kind of size you'd prefer.

In the example shown by Windows Latest, the tech site expands the Copilot side-bar to fill almost half the desktop. (Technically making it a bit more than a side-bar, but we won't get bogged down in semantics here).

Further flexibility could be brought to the Copilot panel in the future, and it's not difficult to imagine that the user will be given the ability to move it from the right-hand side of the desktop to somewhere else.

Although that said, Microsoft won't let you shift the taskbar away from the bottom of the screen in Windows 11, so who knows. (Remember that in Windows 10, it's possible to move the taskbar to the sides or top of the desktop, whatever your preferred option, but for some reason, choice has got thinner on the ground with the UI of Windows 11 in a number of ways).

As well as working on the interface, Microsoft has got a ton of stuff to do with fleshing out Copilot in terms of what it can actually do within Windows 11. The promise is of an AI assistant that can apply a whole bunch of settings changes, deep within the UI, when asked, saving you the effort of having to negotiate a maze of submenus; but that reality isn't nearly here yet.

Copilot isn't yet rolling out to all Windows 11 users, either. As we recently heard, so far it's only the US, UK, and some Asian and South American countries that have got the AI assistant. Eventually, though, there will be a broader rollout for Copilot.

In other recent Windows news, a fresh report has shot down a recent rumor that Microsoft is planning to charge a subscription fee for Windows 12, or whatever the next-gen version of the desktop OS ends up being called. Clearly, that's good news, although we do have concerns that Microsoft might be pushing to monetize by putting more and more ads in Windows.