Do you use the Windows 10 News app on your PC? If you haven’t looked at it for a while, you might be surprised by what it can do. Configure it with the news topics that interest you.
For example, it can be customised to fetch only the news you are interested in and it can filter out the stories you don’t want to see. It has also been updated to match the mobile apps and if you use Microsoft News on an iPhone or Android phone, the Windows app offers a similar look and experience. There is even a smart dark theme in the app’s settings that is easy on the eye.
Here is a guide to adding topics and sources to the News app and configuring it to work the way you want it to.
Start with News
The News app has changed quite a lot over the years since it was first bundled with Windows 8. The Windows 10 version is a useful app and a great source of news on a wide range of topics. The app leads you through setting up some news sources when it is first run and you may have made some selections to get you started.
The news sources are quite limited, but are still useful. Either during the first run or at any time by opening the menu sidebar and selecting Sources, you can choose where the app pulls its news stories from.
The sources are organised into categories on the left, like Lifestyle, Sports, Politics, Entertainment and so on. Select a category and click the green star icon to make it a source of news.
The news sources available depend where you are in the world and local services are favoured. There may not be a lot of choice where some people live, but as we will see, it is not the only source of news stories.
To remove a source and stop seeing news stories, click the green star icon to turn it off.
Configure News with your interests
Across the top of the news app is a list of topics that interest you. It might be a short bar if you have not yet added anything, but it is a great feature when set up with your interests.
Open the sidebar and select Interests, or click the third icon down the left. You are promoted to search for interests. You can see I have already added some, but the first time you use the app you might not have any.
Type a word into the search box and look at the suggestions below. I want to add a source of Android news stories, so I entered ‘android’ into the search box. There are several suggestions and it is not obvious which one is best, so it might take some trial and error. I selected ‘android phones’ at the bottom of the suggestions list.
A new tile with your selected interest is add to the end of the collection of tiles. The order of tiles is used for the order of the menu bar when viewing the news. Click and drag the tiles around to rearrange the order. I moved my new ‘android phones’ tile closer to the start, so it is easy to select.
If there are a lot of interests, they don’t all fit across the top of the app. Scroll arrows appear at either end when the mouse hovers there, but it’s a bit of a pain scrolling through them, so don’t add too many interest tiles.
Here is the home screen of the News app with my new ‘android phones’ interest selected in the bar at the top. It shows all the latest Android news.
I am a tech geek and added my favorite tech topics, but you could just as easily add your favourite sports or teams, add music and movie news, and more. Just search for the interest and select a source to add to your interests.
Here is another example and I searched the interests for ‘Donald Trump’. A suggestion was ‘donald trump latest news’. Adding it as a news source shows the latest stories about the president.
Love him or hate him, he does generate a large number of news stories. Follow them in the News app.
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