Xbox One March System Update Rolling Out Today

The March system update for Xbox One is starting to roll out today, addressing some of the biggest feedback you’ve shared with us.

This significant update includes improved matchmaking, party chat and friends features that will make gaming on Xbox One an experience like no other. This update means next week you’ll be able to enjoy Titanfall on the best multiplayer service on the planet, using a new headset or the one you already own, while live broadcasting your games on Twitch (when the updated Twitch app arrives next week.)

Take a look at some of these new features in action:

How do you get the new update? For the vast majority of Xbox One owners who use “Instant On” (the low power state that allows you to instantly power up your console by saying “Xbox On”), the console automatically checks for updates when customers turn it off. This means that once we’ve made the March update available (late tonight, Pacific Time), the next time you turn your console off it will take the update during off-peak hours in your local time. Ultimately, you’ll see it sometime in the next day or two.

For more information on this system update, click over to Xbox Wire. Here is a longer list of the features you’ll see in this update:

Improved Multiplayer & Party chat

  • Cross title party chat
  • Party chat on by default
  • Easier multiplayer invites
  • Easier multiplayer joining
  • Ability to see what the people in your party are doing

Improved Friends List + Profile

  • Improved friends list utility & speed of access
  • Ability to see people you recently played games with
  • See when friends are broadcasting, including live broadcast thumbnails in activity feed
  • Get to a friend’s profile faster using type-ahead suggestions
  • Contextual app menu actions on friends list and activity feed items
  • Enabled more multiplayer (join and invite) actions on user profiles
  • 54 new contest-winning gamerpics

Twitch TV live streaming support

  • Broadcast gameplay on Twitch.TV through Xbox LIVE (When the updated Twitch app ships next week.)
  • Voice support for starting and ending broadcast

Bringing out social in home

  • See favorite friends currently online
  • See friends broadcasting gameplay

Miscellaneous shell improvements

  • View Game Clips while in snap mode
  • Protect user settings with passkey

Browser improvements

  • Control Bing and Google maps with gesture and controller
  • Quick search when highlighting a term on a page
  • When searching from Bing search on the console, direct link to Internet Explorer in order to see additional web results.

New Devices – Driver and Firmware updates

  • Firmware update to the Xbox One controller to support the Xbox One stereo headset adapter
  • Support for 1st and 3rd party headsets
  • Driver updates for the Xbox One Media Remote

SmartGlass Improvements

  • Push notification to your device for Xbox Live messages
  • Quickly see what a friend is doing including presence and recent
  • Enhanced viewing of personal and a friend’s game progress and clips
  • Ability to close snap from SmartGlass

Live TV

  • 50Hz fix – users can set the Live TV app to display at 50Hz for full or fill modes
  • Volume up/down adjustments – user can tailor the number of volume increments when using “volume up” or “volume down” commands
  • IR blasting of power & volume to TVs/AVRs in all regions
  • AVR setup maps to include model number for most sound bars or AVRs when setting up TV

Improved  Audio output support

  • SPDIF (optical out) now supports 5.1 Dolby Digital – enabling devices such as sound bars with only Optical In to be able to receive 5.1 Dolby Digital from console over optical
  • HDMI output now supports stereo uncompressed, 5.1 uncompressed, 7.1 uncompressed or 5.1 Dolby Digital live or 5.1 DTS 

Edit: Updated the list