The eleventh “major” update to Windows 10 is Windows 10 May 2021 Update or version 21H1. As of the 18th of May 2021, Microsoft is slowly rolling it out to users worldwide. First, it gets to the users that hit the “Check for updates” button in Windows Update, and then to others as well, while the company gathers data about its stability. If you want to know what’s new and also what has been removed from Windows 10, read this article:

Few things are new about Windows 10 May 2021 Update

This update is a very minor one, focused mainly on bug fixing and improving the quality of the changes introduced with the previous Windows 10 October 2020 Update. The list of new features is incredibly short and underwhelming:

Windows Hello is getting some improvements

• Windows Hello for biometric authentication gets multi-camera support. It now allows you to set another camera as the default when using high-end displays that include integrated webcams. This is useful for Surface devices if their owners want to connect to a monitor with an additional webcam. That’s quite a small niche of users, isn’t it?
• Windows Defender Application Guard performance improvements, including optimizing the Microsoft Office document opening times.
• Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) Group Policy Service (GPSVC) updating performance improvement to support remote work scenarios.

As you can see, most people won’t even notice that there’s something new in terms of features added to Windows 10. However, you will enjoy a slightly better user experience, with fewer bugs than the previous Windows 10 update.

The old Microsoft Edge has been removed from Windows 10

The Windows 10 May 2021 Update introduces a few changes as removed or deprecated features that are no longer supported. The most interesting change is the removal of the legacy version of Microsoft Edge. After March 9, 2021, this version is no longer supported, and Microsoft actively promotes the new Edge, based on the Chromium rendering engine, that works also with Google Chrome extensions.

The legacy Microsoft Edge has been removed from Windows 10

We like this new version and we highly recommend it to all our readers. To help you out, we are also updating our Microsoft Edge tutorials to cover the latest version.

TIP: One of the most remarkable features in the new Microsoft Edge browser is Collections. We find it useful, so try it out. You might like the Collections too.

The roaming of Windows 10 personalization settings is deprecated

In Windows 10, you can have your Personalization settings synchronized across devices where you use the same Microsoft account. This includes the wallpaper, slideshow, accent colors, and lock screen images.

Windows 10 Personalization settings

This feature still works in Windows 10 May 2021 Update, but it is no longer being developed, and it is planned to be removed in a future update to Windows 10. We know that many users ignored this feature, while some hated it. However, we liked it, and we’re sad to see it planned for retirement.

TIP: Speaking of wallpapers, if you haven’t changed yours in a long time, read 4 ways to change the desktop wallpaper in Windows 10.

Other technical features that are removed or deprecated from Windows 10

Microsoft has decided to remove the Windows 2000 Display Driver Model (XDDM)-based remote display driver. This is a very technical feature that concerns only developers and Independent Software Vendors that use an XDDM-based remote display driver. They should plan a migration to the WDDM driver model.

Another deprecated tool is the Windows Management Instrumentation Command-line (WMIC). The tool is deprecated for Windows Server, and it is superseded by Windows PowerShell for WMI. One thing to note is that this deprecation only applies to the command-line management tool, and the WMI itself is not affected.

All this is practically gibberish for many Windows 10 users, and the gist of it is that they won’t be negatively affected by these removals and deprecations.

Do you want to install the new Windows 10 May 2021 Update?

Before closing this article, comment below and tell us whether you want the Windows 10 May 2021 Update. In the next couple of days, we will publish articles about all the ways to get it and install it on your computer. We will also publish a guide on how to postpone this update if you want that. Stay tuned for more!