Beta1 of NVDA 2026.1 is now available for download and testing. For anyone who is interested in trying out what the next version of NVDA has to offer before it is officially released, we welcome you to download the beta and provide feedback using our issue reporting process.
By installing the beta you will be opting into NVDA’s beta channel, and will only receive update notifications for beta and release candidate (RC) builds. The beta/RC channel will always keep you up to date with the latest NVDA version. The last RC in a release cycle is identical to the final stable release. To return to the stable release channel, upgrade manually to the latest stable build.
Important Notes:
- This release breaks compatibility with add-ons made for NVDA 2025.3.2 and earlier.
- Windows 8.1 is no longer supported. Windows 10 is the minimum Windows version supported. We recommend updating to Windows 11, or when that’s not possible, to the latest Windows 10 version (22H2).
- 32-bit Windows is no longer supported. Windows 10 on ARM is also no longer supported.
- Wiris MathPlayer is no longer supported.
Links
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Download NVDA 2026.1beta1
- SHA256 sum: 77A24B2D9EC4C9FA010397D26F5D1FDD6F94DFB99515466F4DA657417ACE4E2E
- What’s new in this release of NVDA
- Please report any issues on GitHub.
Highlights
This release includes built-in support for reading math content with MathCAT.
There have been several improvements to speech. Spelling errors can now be reported with a sound instead of speech when reading. You can now configure NVDA to automatically say all after successfully recognising content, such as with Windows OCR. NVDA no longer reports the language being read as unsupported when the synthesizer supports the language but not the specific dialect.
Braille support has also been improved. It now continues to work when switching to a secure screen, like the sign-in screen or User Account Control dialog. NVDA messages from the local computer are now shown in braille when controlling a computer via Remote Access. Spelling errors and the number of items in a list in browse mode can now be shown in braille. Other braille bug fixes, including in Microsoft Outlook and LibreOffice Writer, have also been added.
In browse mode in web browsers, NVDA no longer treats controls with 0 width or height as invisible. This may make it possible to access previously inaccessible “screen reader only” content on some websites. Malformed links no longer prevent NVDA from reading content in Google Chrome and other Chromium-based browsers. The browse mode highlighter now appears on content recognition results, such as when using Windows OCR. In Microsoft Word, unassigned Quick Navigation commands to jump to references have been added. They are also now shown in the elements list.
It is now possible to view virus scan results for an add-on from the Add-on Store. For add-ons that include one, you can also view an add-on’s changelog. The reliability of background add-on updates has been improved.
A new “Privacy and Security” category has been added to NVDA’s settings dialog. The “Logging level” and “Allow NV Access to gather NVDA usage statistics” settings have been moved here from the “General” category. The settings for Screen Curtain have also been moved here from the “Vision” category. Additionally, Screen Curtain’s settings are now configuration profile independent.
The NVDA interface is now translated to Cambodian. Liblouis, Unicode CLDR and eSpeak NG have been updated. Added tables for English Grade 3, Japanese (Rokuten Kanji), and Macedonian uncontracted braille. Improved the Biblical Hebrew, Unified English Braille, Greek International, Hungarian, Norwegian, Portuguese 8-dot and Slovakian braille tables. Emoji localizations for Luxembourgish have been added.
There have also been many other bug fixes and improvements.
