Microsoft Paint has received several new features over the past few months, including DALL-E 3-powered Cocreator and the ability to remove the background image. Microsoft has even added a Photoshop-like layers feature. Now, Paint on Windows 11 is getting another new AI feature that may rely on NPU.

As you may know, NPU or Neural Processing Unit, is a specialized hardware component shipped with new Windows 11 PCs to handle AI and machine learning tasks directly on devices. Instead of relying on the cloud or general-purpose CPUs, new-gen Windows PCs can use NPU, which handles AI tasks natively.

In the new version of Microsoft Paint, Windows Latest spotted a file called “NPUDetect”, which suggests that the Windows 11 app will soon be able to detect and possibly utilize a Neural Processing Unit (NPU) on the device. Paint already comes with AI-powered Cocreator mode, so what could this mean?

Microsoft Paint may be integrating AI features that require NPU capabilities, such as advanced image editing tools or real-time effects that leverage AI algorithms directly on the device.

Or Microsoft is working on something else.

This is a speculation and based on evidence found inside the .appxbundle of Paint and is speculative, but the presence of NPUDetect in the app does confirm that another new AI feature is coming to Windows 11.

Paint isn’t the only app that is getting new AI features. We’ve seen similar improvements for the built-in Photos app, recently updated with a Google Magic Eraser-like “Generative Erase” feature on Windows 10 and 11.

Photos app has also received a Paint-like tool that lets you remove the background from the image.

Similarly, Microsoft is testing new ways to deeply integrate Copilot into Windows 11, with one of the experimental features even allowing people to view the IP addresses of their devices.

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