What's New in NVDA

2016.1

Highlights of this release include the ability to optionally lower the volume of other sounds; improvements to braille output and braille display support; several significant fixes to Microsoft Office support; and fixes to browse mode in iTunes.

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

Changes for Developers

2015.4

Highlights of this release include performance improvements in Windows 10; inclusion in the Ease of Access Center in Windows 8 and later; enhancements for Microsoft Excel, including listing and renaming of sheets and access to locked cells in protected sheets; and support for editing of rich text in Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome and Mozilla Thunderbird.

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

2015.3

Highlights of this release include initial support for Windows 10; the ability to disable single letter navigation in browse mode (useful for some web apps); improvements in Internet Explorer; and fixes for garbled text when typing in certain applications with braille enabled.

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

Changes for Developers

2015.2

Highlights of this release include the ability to read charts in Microsoft Excel and support for reading and interactive navigation of mathematical content.

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

Changes for Developers

2015.1

Highlights of this release include browse mode for documents in Microsoft Word and Outlook; major enhancements to support for Skype for Desktop; and significant fixes for Microsoft Internet Explorer.

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

Changes for Developers

2014.4

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

Changes for Developers

2014.3

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

Changes for Developers

2014.2

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

2014.1

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

Changes for Developers

2013.3

New Features

Bug Fixes

Changes for Developers

2013.2

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

Changes for Developers

2013.1.1

This release fixes the problem where NVDA crashed when started if configured to use the Irish language, as well as including updates to translations and some other bug fixes.

Bug Fixes

2013.1

Highlights of this release include a more intuitive and consistent laptop keyboard layout; basic support for Microsoft PowerPoint; support for long descriptions in web browsers; and support for input of computer braille for braille displays which have a braille keyboard.

Important

New Laptop Keyboard Layout

The laptop keyboard layout has been completely redesigned in order to make it more intuitive and consistent. The new layout uses the arrow keys in combination with the NVDA key and other modifiers for review commands.

Please note the following changes to commonly used commands:

Name Key
Say all NVDA+a
Read current line NVDA+l
Read current text selection NVDA+shift+s
Report status bar NVDA+shift+end

In addition, among other changes, all of the object navigation, text review, mouse click and synth settings ring commands have changed. Please see the Commands Quick Reference document for the new keys.

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

Changes for Developers

2012.3

Highlights of this release include support for Asian character input; experimental support for touch screens on Windows 8; reporting of page numbers and improved support for tables in Adobe Reader; table navigation commands in focused table rows and Windows list-view controls; support for several more braille displays; and reporting of row and column headers in Microsoft Excel.

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

Changes for Developers

2012.2.1

This release addresses several potential security issues (by upgrading Python to 2.7.3).

2012.2

Highlights of this release include an in-built installer and portable creation feature, automatic updates, easy management of new NVDA add-ons, announcement of graphics in Microsoft Word, support for Windows 8 Metro style apps, and several important bug fixes.

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

Changes for Developers

2012.1

Highlights of this release include features for more fluent reading of braille; indication of document formatting in braille; access to much more formatting information and improved performance in Microsoft Word; and support for the iTunes Store.

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

Changes for Developers

2011.3

Highlights of this release include automatic speech language switching when reading documents with appropriate language information; support for 64 bit Java Runtime Environments; reporting of text formatting in browse mode in Mozilla applications; better handling of application crashes and freezes; and initial fixes for Windows 8.

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

Changes for Developers

2011.2

Highlights of this release include major improvements concerning punctuation and symbols, including configurable levels, custom labelling and character descriptions; no pauses at the end of lines during say all; improved support for ARIA in Internet Explorer; better support for XFA/LiveCycle PDF documents in Adobe Reader; access to text written to the screen in more applications; and access to formatting and color information for text written to the screen.

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

Changes for Developers

2011.1.1

This release fixes several security and other important issues found in NVDA 2011.1.

Bug Fixes

2011.1

Highlights of this release include automatic reporting of new text output in mIRC, PuTTY, Tera Term and SecureCRT; support for global plugins; announcement of bullets and numbering in Microsoft Word; additional key bindings for braille displays, including keys to move to the next and previous line; support for several Baum, HumanWare and APH braille displays; and reporting of colors for some controls, including IBM Lotus Symphony text controls.

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

Changes for Developers

2010.2

Notable features of this release include greatly simplified object navigation; virtual buffers for Adobe Flash content; access to many previously inaccessible controls by retrieving text written to the screen; flat review of screen text; support for IBM Lotus Symphony documents; reporting of table row and column headers in Mozilla Firefox; and significantly improved user documentation.

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

2010.1

This release focuses primarily on bug fixes and improvements to the user experience, including some significant stability fixes.

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

2009.1

Major highlights of this release include support for 64 bit editions of Windows; greatly improved support for Microsoft Internet Explorer and Adobe Reader documents; support for Windows 7; reading of the Windows logon, control+alt+delete and User Account Control (UAC) screens; and the ability to interact with Adobe Flash and Sun Java content on web pages. There have also been several significant stability fixes and improvements to the general user experience.

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

0.6p3

New Features

Changes

Bug Fixes

0.6p2

0.6p1

Access to web content with new in-process virtualBuffers (so far for Mozilla Gecko applications including Firefox3 and Thunderbird3)

Internationalization

Speech

Performance

Key commands

Application support

APIs and toolkits

Mouse

Object presentation and interaction

User Interface

0.5