Microsoft's 2030 Vision: AI-Driven Windows to Replace Keyboard and Mouse

Microsoft's CVP thinks we'll ditch the keyboard and mouse for voice commands in 2030, but I'm not convinced

* Microsoft predicts keyboards and mice will be obsolete in five years due to AI advancements. * Microsoft envisions Windows in 2030 will focus on voice-activated controls and AI integration. * The idea of replacing keyboards and mice with voice commands may face skepticism among users, especially for tasks like social media and gaming. The keyboard and mouse are weird relics in the computing world. We've seen a ton of different concepts that aim to revolutionise each of them, make them more ergonomic and useful for our needs in a modern era. Still, we always seem to default back to the traditional designs that we've come to know over the years. And that's not even touching upon products that claim they'll make the keyboard and mouse redundant; I don't think I've ever seen one catch on in a big way. Well, Microsoft seems to think that the humble keyboard and mouse have their days numbered; five years of days, in fact. However, while they make a pretty solid argument, I don't think they're going away anytime soon. Microsoft's vision for Windows in 2030 involves talking to your computer a whole bunch As spotted by Windows Central, Microsoft has uploaded a new video to its YouTube channel. The video puts the spotlight on Microsoft's Corporate Vice President, David Weston, as he discusses where he sees the operating system going. Called "2030 Vision," the concept is all about exploring how Windows will look and feel in five year's time. David goes over a ton of stuff, and as you might expect, AI plays a huge part. However, the boldest claim appears right at the start, where David predicts the following: The world of, sort of, mousing around, and keyboarding around, and typing, will feel as alien, as it does to Gen Z to sort of...use DOS. That's a drastic prediction, and it begs the question: if not mouse and keyboard, then how will people control their PCs? Well, David believes the key to ending our dependence on physical input devices lies in conversation: I think we will do less with our eyes and more talking to our computers, and I truly believe the future version of Windows and other Microsoft operating systems will interact in both, uh - in a multimodal way. The computer will be able to see what we see, hear what we hear, and we can talk to it and ask it to do much more sophisticated things, So I think this will be a much more natural form of communication. Now, I don't know about you, but I think I've heard this one before. Remember back in the Windows Vista days, when Microsoft touted that Cortana could make using the operating system truly hands-free? Yeah, that didn't go down so great. I get that modern-day LLMs likely have far better speech recognition than Cortana had, and I get that LLMs allow people to talk to an AI as if it were a person, using the same speech patterns we use in daily conversation and allowing the model to extrapolate what the user wants from the data. However, I'm still unsure that people will want to use voice commands, especially in five years' time. Maybe in twenty or so years, we'll have evolved past the keyboard and mouse and use something else, and even then, it's a "maybe." But the idea of keyboard and mice becoming "alien" is a step too far for me to believe, especially when it comes down to using social media and gaming. I don't think voice commands will replace chatting in Discord while raiding a dungeon in your fave MMO. If you didn't like Cortana as much as I did, be sure to check out our picks of the ten most useless features added to Windows, where the doomed assistant takes the number four spot.

Watch: Microsoft's vision of how Windows will work in five years

Among other things, keyboards and mice will apparently be replaced by AI agents. Microsoft has shared a video in which David Weston, who holds the title of Corporate Vice President of Enterprise & Security, shares his vision of how Windows will work in 2030. Here's what his vision looks like: As it turns out, the use of AI agents will mean that we'll no longer need keyboards and mice for our computers. According to Weston, keyboards and mice will feel "as alien as DOS" to Gen Z (which seems an odd statement given that Gen Z is already between 13 and 30 years old). Judging by the comments on the video, few are interested in the future being painted. For example, many users say they would rather switch to Linux or Mac than run Windows without a keyboard and mouse.

Microsoft teases the future of Windows: 'The computer will be able to see what we see, hear what we hear, and we can talk to it'

AI will power the ability to 'do much more sophisticated things' Ever wondered what Windows will be like at the turn of the decade, when 2030 rolls around? Windows Central discovered a video clip uploaded on Microsoft's YouTube channel in which its Corporate VP for OS Security, David Weston, provides his vision for Windows in 2030 (you can watch it below). In the short interview, Weston delivers answers to some set questions which are mostly on the topic of security (unsurprisingly, given that's his expertise), AI, jobs, and the business world. He does address the title of the video at one point, though, and gives us his thoughts on how Windows might look by the end of the decade. Weston observes: "I think we will do less with our eyes and more talking to our computers. And I truly believe that a future version of Windows, and other Microsoft operating systems, will interact in a multi-modal way." "The computer will be able to see what we see, hear what we hear, and we can talk to it and ask it to do much more sophisticated things. I think it will be a much more natural form of communication." Weston adds: "The world of mousing around and typing will feel as alien as it does to Gen-Z to use MS-DOS." Much of the rest of the video discusses AI and jobs, as mentioned, and how we can expect AI to take over grunt work to free us humans up to do more interesting and creative tasks (or that's the long-held theory anyway). And indeed, how future security experts will be AI bots that you'll interact with just like a real person, talking to them in video chats and meetings, or emailing to give them tasks. To me, this doesn't feel like a vision of Windows in five years' time (well, it's nearer four if we want to nit-pick, and I do), but a good deal further out than that. Although Weston does hint that this is a broader vision of a 'future version of Windows', and I get the gist: the future is 'multimodal' - moving away from the simple mouse and keyboard as the main inputs for the PC - and, of course, everything's built around AI (naturally). Will the future of Windows be like this, though? I'm certainly not betting against it being focused heavily on AI, as that very much looks to be the case. In general, AI feels like an almost irresistible force in terms of where computers are heading, and Microsoft is clearly trying to jam more AI into Windows wherever it can - a path that the software giant is doubtless going to forge ahead with. Today, I've been writing about clues hidden in the background of Windows 11 that suggest another AI agent might be coming to the taskbar in the desktop OS. That possible addition would live alongside the agent already introduced to the Settings app, which is a smart addition. With powerful NPUs potentially set to be included in desktop chips soon, as well as Copilot+ laptops, AI is likely to become much more widespread in the world of PCs pretty swiftly. I'd even go as far as to guess that the next version of Windows won't be Windows 12, but Windows AI (or Windows Copilot maybe, if that's still the brand for AI), the focus on this arena is likely to be that strong. There are promises, lofty ideas, and marketing around AI, though - and then the reality of what Microsoft can achieve. Remember when Copilot was first introduced to Windows 11? We were told it would be able to change a swathe of settings in the operating system based on a vague prompt from the user (like 'make me more productive'). That still hasn't happened, and appears to be firmly on the back burner. Which is to say that while I don't doubt that Microsoft has these big ambitions, whether a very different way of working with a Windows PC will happen in 2030 seems doubtful to me. Granted, I can indeed envision that talking - giving voice commands (which are coming along nicely in Windows 11) - could become a much more important, but still supplementary, part of the Windows experience and interface. And AI (presumably) doing more sophisticated things, yes, fair enough - maybe even manipulating Windows settings in one fell swoop at the behest of the user will be realized in a manner that works well. Hey, maybe Windows AI, or Windows 2030, or whatever it ends up being called, will finally get rid of the legacy Control Panel, as a commenter on Weston's video amusingly observes. Hah - it makes me feel giddy just to imagine it. This is a battle Microsoft has been fighting for far too long, after all, But mouse-and-keyboard usage is being made to feel like the equivalent of us being forced to revert to the days of DOS, all text and tinkering with the config.sys and autoexec.bat files to get a PC game to work? That feels like more than a stretch, and something much, much further away in the Windows computing timeline - but I could be wrong.

Kiss goodbye to your keyboard and mouse, in Microsoft's vision for the Windows OS in 2030 they'll both 'feel as alien as it does for Gen Z to use DOS'

"The world of mousing around and keyboarding around and typing will feel as alien as it does to Gen Z to use DOS." So says David Weston, Corporate Vice President of Enterprise and OS Security at Microsoft about the future of Windows. How so, exactly? AI, of course! Oh and FYI, unlimited compute thanks to quantum will arrive within five years. Yeah, really. Weston doesn't put a precise time frame on the demise of ye olde rodent and pecking board. But his comments come in a new video posted on Microsoft's official Windows YouTube channel titled, "Microsoft Windows 2030 Vision." Could the mouse and keyboard really be dead that fast? According to Weston, this brave new human-machine paradigm will be possible thanks to AI. "I think we will do less with our eyes and more talking to our computers," he says, "it will be a much more natural form of communication." We'll also be able to ask our PCs to do much more sophisticated things, like manage security, which is Weston's area of expertise at Microsoft. "In five years, I strongly believe you'll be able to be hire a security expert, what's actually under the hood will be an AI agent. But the way you interact with it will be a lot like you do with humans today," he explains. You'll talk to this AI agent on Teams, send emails, set tasks and so on. That will allow small and medium sized businesses to access a level of security services that are only currently viable for large enterprises. More generally, Weston sees this AI revolution taking the tedium out of our working lives and empowering us all to focus on the fun and rewarding stuff. That will everyone to do, "less of the toil work, the work we don't love today, and allow them to focus on what humans are good at: Ideation, creativity, vision, connecting with other humans on what products are necessary." As if that wasn't enough, Weston drops another bomb. In setting out his predictions for the major trends over the next five years, he reckons, "we will have unlimited compute in the form of quantum." For Weston, the main implication is the impact on security and encryption. But unlimited compute in just five years? That's quite the claim and doesn't necessarily square with the view of other experts, like Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang. As it happens, that won't actually impact how Weston sees the basic tenets of security. Instead, he thinks the fundamentals stay the same. That means really simple things like updating to the latest security patch and rotating your passwords. "The basics still stop 98% of attacks. 20 years ago that was true, 20 years before that was true," he says. And he doesn't see that changing. It will be interesting to see how accurate Weston proves to be. You could say reports of the death of the keyboard and mouse have been greatly exaggerated often enough in the past. Whether it's plain old touch screens, VR and hand gestures, or even brain implants, plenty of technologies have been mooted as the next big thing in PC control interfaces. But here we are in 2025 and it's still all about keyboard and mouse. Or maybe trackpad if you're mobile. It will certainly be interesting to see exactly what technologies Microsoft rolls out in this regard between now and 2030. But I can't help feeling that reality won't quite match Weston's vision. If nothing else, speaking to a computer isn't necessarily more frictionless and lower effort than typing, never mind the privacy and interpersonal etiquette around the idea of everyone in open-plan offices barking into their PCs. Watch this space, but I'm betting I'll still be bashing away ineffectually, if manually, in 2030.

This is how Microsoft dreams Windows 2030

Microsoft says Windows could prioritize natural language by 2030, replacing mouse and keyboard, while AI agents handle security and routine workplace communication tasks. Microsoft has released a "Windows 2030 Vision" video predicting that natural language will become the primary interaction method with its operating system by 2030, aiming to replace traditional mouse and keyboard usage. This forward-looking projection suggests a fundamental shift in human-computer interaction over the next five years. David Weston, Microsoft's Corporate Vice President of Enterprise & Security, provided insights for the video, which appears to be the initial installment in a series exploring the future of Windows. Weston's first specific prediction centers on the workplace, stating that within five years, companies will be capable of employing AI agents to function as security experts. These AI entities are envisioned to integrate seamlessly into a human work environment, participating in activities such as communication on Teams and attendance at meetings. Weston explained that such agentic AI applications would assume "toil" work, thereby enabling human employees to concentrate on other responsibilities. Weston also elaborated on the nature of future human-computer interaction, stating, "I think we will do less with our eyes and more talking to our computers." He expressed a belief that forthcoming versions of Windows and other Microsoft operating systems will engage users in a multimodal fashion. This capability would allow the computer to perceive what the user sees and hears, facilitating more complex interactions through verbal commands. Weston characterized this approach as a more natural form of communication between users and their devices. Microsoft has made substantial financial commitments to artificial intelligence initiatives. This includes an investment exceeding $13 billion in OpenAI, as well as a $650 million deal with Inflection AI. These investments underscore the company's strategy to integrate an increasing number of AI features across its product portfolio. The concept of an agentic AI-driven Windows operating system, responsive to voice commands, has been presented, though its realization by 2030 remains a subject of discussion. The "Windows 2030 Vision" video has garnered more dislikes than likes, indicating public sentiment. Earlier AI feature introductions by Microsoft, such as those related to Copilot and Copilot+ laptops, did not fully meet initial expectations. Furthermore, Microsoft has encountered situations where highly promoted AI features received significant negative feedback, necessitating their withdrawal or modification. A notable instance of this dynamic is the ongoing "Recall" feature, which involved screenshot capture capabilities. The assertion that mouse and keyboard inputs will become comparable to using DOS for Gen Z by 2030 is viewed as improbable within a five-year timeframe.

Microsoft's vision for Windows in 2030 doesn't include a keyboard and mouse

TL;DR: Microsoft envisions Windows 2030 transforming user interaction through AI Agents, replacing traditional keyboard and mouse inputs with natural language communication. This shift aims to enhance productivity, creativity, and security, supported by advanced quantum-resistant technologies as part of the Windows Resiliency Initiative in the evolving AI era. The official Windows channel on YouTube has posted a new video where David Weston, Corporate Vice President of Enterprise & OS Security at Microsoft, talks about what using Windows in 2030 might look like. And that vision doesn't include using a keyboard and mouse to navigate Windows to open up a browser or fire up Explorer or an app like Steam. "The world of mousing around and keyboarding around and typing will feel as alien as it does to Gen Z to use DOS," David Weston says. So then, if we're not "mousing around," how will we interact with our Windows PCs? AI Agents. In this relatively strange vision of Windows in 2030, you'll talk to your team of AI Agents with natural language and get them to do everything for you. "These agents will be net amplifiers and enable us to do things that we could only dream of just a few years ago," David explains. "I think we will do less with our eyes and more talking to our computers. The computer will be able to see what we see, (listen to) what we hear, and we can talk to it, and ask it to do much more sophisticated things. I think this will be a much more natural form of communication." One example would be "hiring" an AI Agent that's a security expert that you'd be able to interact with, just like a human. That means talking to them on Teams, sending them emails, setting tasks, and more. And in turn, this will free us up to focus on fun stuff like "ideation, creativity, vision," and "connecting with other humans." Although it's unlikely that PCs are going to drop the keyboard and mouse as the primary form of interaction anytime soon, David Weston's security expertise does offer some interesting insights into the future. The video also includes him talking about current Windows 11 quantum-resistant technologies and that a post-quantum computing world with unlimited compute power is something Microsoft is already on top of when it comes to security. In fact, the video is essentially all about the Windows Resiliency Initiative and Microsoft's focus on security in the AI era. And not about how we're all going to be playing Counter-Strike 2 using a neural interface in a couple of years.

Mouse & keyboards will become alien: Microsoft plans to change the way you use computers with new operating system

Microsoft has released a new video teasing its "Windows 2030 Vision," the first in a series expected to be published in the coming days. The video indicates significant changes to the Windows operating system over the next five years, with a focus on artificial intelligence (AI) integration. David Weston, Microsoft's Corporate Vice President of Enterprise & Security, features in the video, hinting at a new desktop user experience enabled by agentic AI designed to act on users' behalf. In the video, Weston states, "I truly believe the future version of Windows and other Microsoft operating systems will interact in a multimodal way. The computer will be able to see what we see, hear what we hear, and we can talk to it and ask it to do much more sophisticated things." He adds that traditional input methods like mouse and keyboard "will feel as alien as it does to Gen Z [using] MS-DOS." While details remain limited, Weston's remarks suggest a future where AI is deeply embedded in the operating system, allowing users to interact through natural language and multiple input modes, with AI managing workflows and tasks. Previously, Microsoft has outlined a vision where AI operates inside, beside, and outside applications. At Build 2023, Steven Bathiche described AI as an active part of Windows that can manage apps, files, and tasks through voice and natural language input. This represents a shift from current AI tools that are primarily standalone or embedded within apps to AI functioning at the OS level as an agent handling complex workflows. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has similarly indicated that AI will transform operating systems and user interfaces. At the 2023 Snapdragon Summit, he remarked that AI "will fundamentally change what an operating system is, what a UI looks like, and how application interaction goes," reinforcing the company's direction toward integrating AI more deeply into Windows. The video signals Microsoft's intention to redefine the Windows user experience by 2030 through advanced AI capabilities, though specific features and timelines remain to be disclosed in future updates. (With inputs from TOI)