Later this month marks the one year anniversary of Xbox One. As we look back on the year, one of the best marks of progress for Xbox One has been our commitment to delivering continuous innovation. When Xbox One launched, we said we were deeply committed to our fans and our ongoing service updates have delivered hundreds of new features throughout the year. In fact, we launched a new website, Xbox Feedback, to enable us to hear from you directly and let you vote for your favorite ideas. We received thousands of new feature recommendations and more than three quarters of a million votes this past year, and your feedback played a huge role in shaping new experiences on Xbox One. Keep them coming!
Here are some of the most popular new features added this past year, but also check out a recap of the full list of previously announced new features below. You may find a few surprises to help you make the most of your Xbox One. And rest assured, our commitment to continuous innovation remains strong.
Customization
- Custom backgrounds. The #1 fan-requested feature, each account on your Xbox One can have a customized background. You can choose a custom color or achievement art as your background on Xbox One, with more customization options coming down the road, like personalized images from the media browser app.
- Take system updates when you want. Take system updates as soon as they’re available if you prefer. When the system update is made available, you’ll find the option under Settings, then select System update.
New Friends, Activities and Achievements
- New Friends section. See at a glance what’s going on with your friends. You can stay up-to-date with your current activities, the most popular games your friends are playing, and a Gamerscore leaderboard to see who has improved their Gamerscore over the last 30 days.
- Activity feed updates. We added new ways for you to interact with friends in the activity feed. The interface changed to a single column scrolling list that is longer and includes more content. We added the ability to post text to your feed, and to “like” and comment on feed items. You can share game clips and anything else in the feed with friends either publically (to your activity feed) or privately (as an attachment to a message). You are also notified when anyone likes, comments on or shares your items. Each person gets a personal feed on their profile, so you can see what specific friends have been up to. And, with SmartGlass, you can see what your friends have shared to their activity feed and “like” specific posts.
- A New Achievements App. Updated to enable sharing of achievements you’ve unlocked with captions, see a list of friends who have unlocked specific achievements, and an updated achievements Snap landing page that shows Achievements on recently played games, when a gamer is not actively playing a game.
- Snap updates. We updated the Snap Center to include quick access to many of the things you wanted faster access to when playing a game – Friends, Messages, Achievements, Game DVR, clock, and battery indicator – as well as making it easier to close and open new snap apps when playing a game. A double tap of the Xbox button on your controller brings up a menu that allows you to open a new app in snap mode, close the current snapped app, or switch focus between your game and your running snapped app.
Second Screen and Accessories
- Mobile purchase. Using Xbox SmartGlass or on Xbox.com, you can remotely purchase games and Add-on content. No more waiting to begin downloading when you get home – if your console is set to automatically take updates, your console will begin downloading your purchase. And, you can also get Games with Gold and Deals with Gold on SmartGlass, so you can download free games wherever you are to your console.
- Battery power indicator. We brought back the battery power indicator so that you can see right on the home screen how much juice is left in your controller’s battery. You will also get an on-screen notification when your controller battery is getting low.
System and Game Updates
- Silent reboot after system updates and system update on demand. If your console is in Instant On mode, the update will happen automatically and return to standby upon completion. This means you won’t need to power on your console after an update moving forward. If you want to take future updates when available without waiting for your console to do it on its own, this option is under system settings. It will only show as available when there is an update to take.
- Game and app saves and updates. A game save progress bar will show you the status of your game saves. You can easily tell what games and apps are being updated or have been updated recently.
More Ways to Experience Entertainment
- Boot to TV. You can set your console to boot directly to television when coming out of connected standby.
- Media Player, DLNA, and MKV support (and more!). A newly added Media Player app supports DLNA streaming so you can easily access and play music, watch photo slideshows or movies stored on home media servers and devices that support the DLNA server protocols. Additionally, you can playback tons of files – including MKV – stored on a USB device or a device on your home network that supports DLNA streaming.
- Xbox One Digital TV Tuner and Steam TV to SmartGlass. This USB-attached TV Tuner, available in UK, France, Germany, Italy and Spain, enables you to watch TV on Xbox One, and pause Live TV for up to 30 minutes. If you have an Xbox One Digital TV Tuner, you can stream TV across your home network to your smartphone or tablet using the Xbox SmartGlass app. You can also pause, play, rewind and change channels, without interrupting gameplay.
- TV Discovery Made More Social. New features were introduced for social discovery on TV, including Live TV Trending, Twitter TV Trending, Xbox TV Trending, and Tweets in MiniGuide.
Audio
- Sound mixer for apps with Snap and volume controls when using Kinect with chat. With the Sound mixer, you can control the volume levels of two apps when you’re using Snap letting you decide which app is louder. In this same section, you can control the volume levels when you’re using Kinect for chat.
Here is a more comprehensive list of the more than 100 new updates we announced details on this year, in addition to the hundreds of additional updates made behind-the-scenes to make Xbox One even better this year:
1. See and manage your storage space
2. Control your install lineup and more easily manage your download queue
3. Separate My Games and My Apps lists so you can easily create separate queues for both
4. Track how much battery life is left on your controller
5. Support for your USB keyboard with your Xbox One
6. Friends list moved to front and center on the homepage of the Friends app
7. Party chat turns on by default
8. Chat with friends playing different games
9. “Invite friends to game” option available in your multiplayer titles
10. See a list of “Recent Players”
11. Twitch live streaming support
12. Optical out supports 5.1 Dolby Digital
13. Support for Dolby Digital surround sound over HDMI
14. Support for 50Hz output for TV
15. Tailor the number of volume up/down adjustments
16. SmartGlass updates: Receive notifications of Xbox Live messages, check out what your friends are doing, see their latest highlight clips, and unsnap apps with SmartGlass
17. Support for new Xbox One accessories: Xbox One Stereo Headset and Adapter, Xbox One Media Remote, and third party headsets
18. Browser improvements: Direct link to IE, new gesture and controller features for Bing and Google maps, and search improvements
19. IR blasting of power and volume to TVs/AVRs for all regions
20. Easy sound bar setup
21. View Game Clips in Snap mode
22. Passkey feature to protect user settings
23. Support for 50Hzoutput for Blu-ray
24. Controller and headset adaptor firmware updates that reduce audio static and improve wireless connectivity
25. Silent reboot after system updates and system update on demand
26. Improved GameDVR video quality through compression algorithm improvements
27. Kinect voice and motion improvements for quality and reliability of Xbox One commands
28. Game save progress bar shows the status of your game saves
29. See what games and apps are being updated or have been updated recently
30. Notifications to see when favorites and friends sign in to Xbox Live
31. Friends who are in multiplayer are identified in the friends list
32. Sound Mixer for apps in Snap mode
33. Volume control when using Kinect with chat
34. Opt-in to help improve speech recognition
35. Take the next system update when you want
36. External storage support
37. The ability to add your real name
38. OneGuide and Universal Remote Control added to SmartGlass
39. Select an account for automatic sign-in
40. For Xbox One owners in Canada and Europe, access to OneGuide and more TV, SmartGlass, and voice features
41. Games with Gold & Deals with Gold
42. All Xbox Live members can access popular gaming and entertainment apps without a Gold membership
43. Snap Mode for Achievements
44. Double-tap to launch Snap Center
45. Choice of spoken language in New Zealand, Ireland, and Austria
46. Background updates for future digital bundles and compilation discs
47. Ability to like GameDVR clips
48. Activity feed updates: New ways for you to interact with friends in the activity feed
49. Mobile purchase from SmartGlass or Xbox.com
50. Low battery notification
51. Disable notifications during video
52. Enabling 3D Blu-ray
53. OneGuide in Brazil, Mexico, Austria and Ireland
54. Last seen time in Friends list
55. Pre-order and pre-download titles
56. Expanded Friends area on Home
57. A new Media Player app for USB and DLNA playback
58. Improved Party app with party leader settings
59. New features for SmartGlass: Post status messages from the Activity Feed and comments, share items from both your Activity Feed and Game Clips, personalized Activity Feed added to your profile, threaded messages, record game clips directly from the Now Playing bar, What’s New page highlighting the features of each release
60. “Xbox On” capabilities in Australia, Canada (French), Italy, Spain, Mexico and Brazil
61. Boot directly to television when coming out of connected standby
62. Manage controllers and other accessories under Settings – Devices & Accessories
63. Bandwidth Usage shows users how much bandwidth their Xbox One is consuming over a period of time
64. Choose multiple GameDVR clips to delete at once in the Upload app
65. Save Avatar Gamerpics to users’ OneDrive
66. Snap Center updated to include quick access to Friends, Messages, Achievements, Game DVR, clock and battery indicator
67. Friends Snap App
68. Messages Snap App
69. Achievements App
70. See a list of top games in your profile and your friend’s most popular games in the Friend’s section of SmartGlass
71. Improvements for TV and video
72. Media Player DLNA and MKV support
73. Live TV Trending based on your country and OneGuide settings
74. USB-attached Xbox One Digital TV Tuner available in Europe (UK, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain)
75. Stream TV to SmartGlass with the Xbox One Digital TV Tuner
76. Live TV MiniGuide for markets where OneGuide is available
77. OneGuide in 12 new countries
78. Apps with live TV channels include their TV listings within OneGuide and other Xbox TV features work with these apps
79. Universal remote control in SmartGlass
80. Live TV initial setup experience
81. Live TV cable & satellite box auto-detection
82. Updated Devices & Accessories page
83. Firmware updates
84. Find my Controller to easily find (or identify) a controller by making it vibrate
85. Hide Games & Apps on your console
86. Password resets and added protection made easier
87. Custom backgrounds
88. Share your location and bio as part of your profile and select a set of showcase items that are displayed
89. Tweet about your favorite game clips
90. Live TV Trending
91. Twitter TV Trending
92. Xbox TV Trending
93. Tweets in MiniGuide
94. Recents and Favorites in MiniGuide
95. Store pages on Xbox One improved to quickly browse and find content
96. Friends’ game activity on SmartGlass
97. Games with Gold & Deals with Gold on SmartGlass
98. SmartGlass Store improved to easily find and download apps for your Xbox One, and a Coming Soon filter for Games and Add Ons
99. Easily snap from a full screen experience and move Internet Explorer into snap mode
100. Internet Explorer featured sites
101. My Stats shared in Preview dashboard
102. Leaderboard added that shows how you stack up against your friends
We can’t thank you enough for your continued feedback and working with us to make Xbox One even better.