Microsoft releases new Windows 10 Mobile preview with flashlight quick action, animated GIF support in Photos app

Microsoft today rolled out a new preview build of Windows 10 for phones. Build 10149 for people in the fast ring of the Windows Insider program provides a few updates that users have been asking for, and it finally changes the name of Microsoft’s next-generation browser from Project Spartan to Microsoft Edge.

Today’s build comes a week after Microsoft released build 10136.

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There’s now a quick action to make the phone’s flash operate as a flashlight, and the Photos app now supports animated GIFs on phones with at least 1GB of RAM, Gabe Aul, head of the data and fundamentals team inside Microsoft’s Operating Systems Group, wrote in a blog post today on the new build.

With Project Spartan becoming Microsoft Edge, users no longer have their favorites, history, cookies, and pages on reading lists from previous builds. Aul warned users last week that this would happen and suggested that they back up that data.

The Edge browser now shows the address bar at the bottom of the screen on the phone. And if you want, you can display a website the way it would look on a desktop with this new build.

The Notebook component of Microsoft’s Cortana personal digital assistant brings together profile and settings components, and users can specify quiet hours there now, too.

Microsoft has also fixed several bugs, including one that stopped the Podcast app from working and one that prevented users from the hiding the navigation bar. But the new build does have some issues — some apps users have paid for may show up as trial versions, for instance. “In-app purchases on Windows 10 Mobile are not functional yet as we migrate the function to the new Windows Store,” Aul wrote. So there’s still more to do.

But generally speaking, the build improves the look and feel of the mobile operating system.

“It is faster, more stable, and more polished overall and has been lots of fun for us to see come together,” Aul wrote. To check it out for yourself, join the Windows Insider program if you haven’t already.