Two weeks after it announced the change, Microsoft is switching the Windows Insider program from rings to channels today.
“Channels have arrived,” the Windows Insider account tweeted today. “Expect the changes to land in your Windows Insider settings over the next few hours. Remember, we’ve done the mapping for you, so there’s no direct change you need to make.”
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As I wrote at the time of the original announcement, this change is largely symbolic, with Microsoft claiming that it’s moving to a “quality-based” build model. But it’s really just a name change. The Fast ring is being renamed to the Dev Channel without any other changes, the Slow ring is being renamed to the Beta channel without any other changes, and the Release Preview ring is being renamed to the Release Preview channel; here, there is one change, but it’s only for businesses: Microsoft will support businesses that deploy the Release Preview channel to some of their users.
I assume that today’s note means that we’ll see the channel language used in Windows Insider settings (Settings > Update & Security > Windows Insider Program).