Windows 11’s November update adds context-menu controls and memory protection

Microsoft’s November update for Windows 11 brings changes to the context menu, Microsoft Edge, recovery tools and memory security. Several features are rolling out gradually, so they may not appear immediately on every eligible PC.

Users can customize which options appear in the right-click menu and remove its top panel. The menu also opens faster. Microsoft Edge launches more quickly after it has already been opened once; Microsoft says it plans to extend that speed-up to other apps in the future. The Edge improvement is available to everyone with the update.

The update adjusts adaptive hibernation so laptops can resume faster from Modern Standby when battery charge is above 80%. It also adds Cloud Rebuild, which can reinstall Windows 11 using a Windows image and device drivers downloaded through Windows Update, without requiring a USB system image. Windows Recovery Environment can reuse saved Wi-Fi settings to connect during recovery. These features are on a gradual rollout.

Microsoft is also expanding memory integrity protection, or HVCI, to eligible existing PCs during updates, while respecting user and IT administrator choices. The feature may be enabled gradually. TechRadar reports that some gamers have seen frame rates fall by around 5% or 10% when memory integrity is on, with the impact varying by hardware; older processors may be more affected. Users can turn it off after the update enables it.