How to Enable AI Actions in Windows 11 File Explorer

Quick Tips

• You need to be enrolled in the Windows Insider program, which is essentially running a beta-test version of Windows with frequent updates and performance reports.
• For the time being, the feature requires an AI PC, but this is expected to be expanded to traditional Intel and AMD architectures.
• Using AI in File Explorer won’t meaningfully change how you navigate your hard drive but can provide more customization options on the fly.

Windows 11 AI actions in File Explorer are Microsoft’s latest push to integrate artificial intelligence directly into your everyday workflows. Currently available in Windows Insider builds, AI Actions transforms File Explorer from a simple file manager to a comprehensive hub for your content. Here’s how to enable it.

What Makes Windows 11 AI Actions in File Explorer Useful

Typically, editing photos or summarizing documents involves opening separate applications, waiting for them to load, and then performing your tasks. AI actions would in theory eliminate a part of this process by offloading most simple or repetitive tasks directly into the right-click context menu.

The key actions these shortcuts allow you include blurring or removing photo backgrounds, erasing objects from images, using Bing Visual Search to find similar images online, and summarizing Word and Excel documents. As such, the Windows 11 AI Actions in File Explorer are meant for anyone who regularly works with images or documents and needs on-the-fly simple edits or more information.

Part 1 – Requirements for Using AI Actions in File Explorer

There are a few vital requirements you need to get the feature working.

• Windows Insider Program membership in either Dev Channel (Build 26200.5603+) or Beta Channel (Build 26120.4151+) with the latest update.
• Copilot+ PC with Snapdragon processors. While AMD and Intel support are supposedly coming soon, this “locks” the feature to a small fraction of Windows 11 users.
• Microsoft 365 Copilot subscription for document summarization features

Additionally, the AI features work for two main file categories depending on the features you need.

• JPG and PNG images for photo editing actions
• .docx, .doc, .pptx, .ppt, .xlsx, .xls, .pdf, .rtf, and .txt files for summarization

Part 2 – Enable Windows 11 AI Actions in File Explorer

If you’ve got an AI PC (or are reading this when the feature is available on “traditional” CPUs), the main barrier to entry is the Windows Insider Program, which is relatively simple to get into.

Step 1. Go to Settings and select “Windows Update.”

Step 2. Click on “Windows Insider Program.”

Step 3. Hit the “Get Started” button, and you’ll get a popup to link an account.

Step 4. Click the “Link an account” button to start the registration process.

Step 5. Choose your Microsoft account or the email you used when registering your device. If your system won’t let you progress through the steps, you can use the online registration page. In there, accept the terms and hit “Register now.”

Step 6. If you click on “Get Started,” you’ll get redirected to your Windows Update settings, where you’ll see a new update branch with Insider-only updates.

Step 7. Update your PC to the latest insider build, which might take time and require restarts (usually about the same as performing cumulative build updates).

Step 8. Once you update, you should get more right-click context menu features when selecting applicable files anywhere in the File Explorer:

• Blur Background: Automatically blurs photo backgrounds while keeping subjects in focus
• Remove Background: Opens Paint with automatic background removal
• Erase Objects: Remove unwanted elements from photos using generative AI
• Bing Visual Search: Find similar images or identify objects online
• Summarize: Generate concise summaries of documents (requires Copilot subscription)

Workaround if the AI Tools Don’t Appear

If the AI Actions menu doesn’t appear after updating, you can manually enable it using ViveTool:

Step 1. Download ViveTool from the official GitHub repository.

Step 2. Extract the files to a new folder on your desktop and copy the folder’s location path.

Step 3. Open the Terminal or Command Prompt as an administrator.

Step 4. Enter the following command:

cd “C:\path\to\your\vivetool\folder”

Step 5. Type the following command and press “Enter:“

vivetool /enable /id:54792954,55345819,48433719

Step 6. Restart your computer

Step 7. Open File Explorer and right-click on supported files to see if the actions appeared.

Note that ViveTool isn’t fully supported by all systems and may result in incompatible updates being delivered to your PC, which could make some aspects unusable.