Former Microsoft designer reveals dynamic wallpapers for Windows 11

Microsoft has been working on dynamic animated wallpapers for Windows 11 for the past few years, and now a former designer has revealed what they actually look like. Former Microsoft motion designer and 3D artist Sergey Kiselev details his work (Behance archive) on dynamic animations for Windows 11, which was originally scheduled to ship in 2023 but is now presumably canceled.

Kiselev worked on Windows design elements and Microsoft's Fluent Design System for more than eight years before moving to Amazon in 2022. In his post on Behance, Kiselev described the dynamic wallpapers as "part of the Windows Creative Direction team's efforts to celebrate a new centered signature composition for Windows 11, highlighting its centered Start menu and taskbar." According to Kiselev, the dynamic wallpapers were part of an effort that was "explored for Microsoft's low-cost devices, primarily targeting educational users." As Windows Central reports, these dynamic wallpapers were originally supposed to ship as part of the 23H2 update for Windows 11, but that never happened. Windows watcher Albacore says that the dynamic wallpaper feature has been scrapped, and its unfinished parts were shipped in both versions 22H2 and 23H2 of Windows 11, but were removed in the latest 24H2 update.

These dynamic wallpapers are very similar to Microsoft's Xbox dashboard, and currently the only way to get animated wallpapers in Windows is to install a third-party app like Wallpaper Engine. Microsoft used to support video as wallpaper with its Windows DreamScene feature in Windows Vista, so it's surprising to see that Microsoft did all this design work to bring back a similar dynamic wallpaper feature and then never shipped it.