Unveiled as a US-only feature for Microsoft’s mobile operating system Windows Phone 8.1 earlier this year, the digital voice assistant Cortana has learned many more languages since. A few months ago, Microsoft made the service available in the United Kingdom, China, and India, and now it is adding a few more languages to the mix. The company announced today that Cortana will now also work in France, Italy, Germany, and Spain. The service, for now, is only available to the Windows Phone Developer Preview program users, but will soon make its way to the stable build as well.
The service is available in alpha-version for now. “Alpha means that Cortana is new to these countries,” explains Marcus Ash, Group Program Manager for Cortana. “Most of the features in the beta version are available but some are missing or coming soon.”
Microsoft notes that Cortana in the new regions isn’t as full-fledged as its US-counterpart yet, but that will change eventually. For now, users won’t be able to use features like flight tracking, and transit data will also map only the big cities. Furthermore, you also won’t be able to find contextual information like say how old Brad Pitt is, for now. But if you’re looking for jokes and other fun stuff, Cortana has you covered. Microsoft assures that more features will be added to it soon.
