A new update for some members of the Xbox Insider Program is fixing a long-standing issue for players with lots of demos and trials on their accounts.
This update (announced on Monday via Xbox Support) is available now, bringing a new tab called Free with Xbox to the My Games and Apps section of the Xbox console's Full Library section. Any demos or limited trials that players have on their accounts will now be moved to this tab, keeping the Owned Games section limited to actual games.
The update is currently just for Alpha Skip-Ahead Ring users, and will likely expand to other testers before becoming available for all Xbox users outside of the Insider program. Per Xbox support, this update also brings various performance improvements, meaning Alpha Skip-Ahead Ring users should have a more stable experience moving forward.
A sorely-needed update for Xbox console users
On the surface, I can understand someone not immediately thinking that this would be a huge issue, but this is a big deal for many players like myself. If you've been playing tons of Xbox games and taking part in betas over the years since the Xbox One first launched in 2013, your account almost assuredly has a lot of various trials that have piled up.
Just recently, I was scrolling through my full library trying to find something, and it was made more difficult by the sheer volume of betas for games like Gears of War 4 that are still tied to my account. It's not the end of the world, but it was needlessly more tedious than it should've been.
Users will see a new section under the Full Library tab in My Games and Apps called "Free with Xbox." Any previously obtained trials and demos will now appear here instead of under "Owned games."
Xbox
Hopefully, this is an update that won't need too long in testing before it's available for all Xbox players. It's not a radical change, but shunting demos and other assorted trials into a dedicated category will go a long way toward making a large library easier to browse.
The Xbox Insider Program has been on a roll this year, with several new features being tested across consoles and PC, such as letting players see their Cloud-playable games on PC. A lot of this platform work is meant to bridge the gap, bringing Xbox and PC experiences closer together, especially with the upcoming launch of the Xbox Ally partner handhelds, which are reportedly slated to launch in October.
PC players are also seeing the rollout of the "aggregated" storefronts, meaning games that players own on Battle.net or Steam can show up in their Xbox PC libraries.
How to join the Xbox Insider Program
If you aren't a part of the Xbox Insider Program, it's free to sign up and join. Just search for the Xbox Insider Bundle in the Xbox Store, then download it. On your Windows PC, you can search the Microsoft Store for the Xbox Insider Hub.
Insiders are allowed to test new features, providing feedback before the features potentially make it out to other Xbox users. Different rings of users get different builds, with the Alpha Skip-Ahead Ring usually at the cutting edge of what's available.
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