Cortana's voice actress, Jen Taylor, also voices the Cortana voice assistant for Windows in the U.S. The series, originally developed by Bungie and then 343 Industries, features an artificial intelligence (AI) character of the same name from the 26th century. The name Cortana comes from Microsoft's flagship game series Halo. Over time, Microsoft has added and removed features. In March 2021, the Cortana mobile app was shut down entirely. Microsoft later began reducing Cortana's prevalence in Windows systems, with Cortana no longer being used in the device setup process and no longer being enabled by default in Windows 11. Cortana is integrated across the Microsoft 365 product suite for use with Windows OSes version 2004 and later and the Microsoft Edge browser.Ĭortana was a major addition to Windows 10 when the OS released but has since fallen in relevance. The text- and voice-enabled virtual assistant uses the Microsoft Bing web search engine to perform tasks such as answering questions. First launched in 2014, Cortana was originally developed for the Windows Phone 8.1 and is included in other Windows devices and operating systems (OSes), including Windows 10 and 11.Ĭortana can perform the following actionable tasks: Gillis, Technical Writer and EditorĬortana is Microsoft's digital assistant.

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