A Microsoft employee apparently accidentally announced that the Windows 11 Notepad app is getting a tabbed feature. The employee, a senior product manager at Microsoft, posted a photo of the Notepad version with a tab, enthusiastically announcing "Notepad in Windows 11 now has a tab!" with a loudspeaker emoji.
The tweet was deleted a few minutes later, but Windows Central and several Windows fan Twitter accounts have spotted the error and made screenshots.
Notepad screenshots include Microsoft's internal warning: "Secret Do not discuss features or take screenshots." The warning indicates that the tab feature is still in early internal testing at Microsoft, but Notepad's tab feature may arrive in Windows Insiders in early 2023.
If Microsoft continues with tabs for Notepad, it will be the first built-in app to get a tabbed interface after Microsoft added tabs to File Explorer earlier this year.
Microsoft initially tested tabs in all Windows 10 apps four years ago in a feature called Sets. This included support for tabs inside Notepad and File Explorer, but Microsoft eventually canceled the project and never sent it to Windows 10 users.
The addition of tabs in Notepad may signal a shift towards tabs appearing in more built-in Windows applications. Microsoft may have canceled feature Sets for Windows 10, but that hasn't stopped Windows users from using third-party tools and applications to turn on tabs in different parts of the operating system.