Xbox Series X dashboard getting a resolution boost for 4K screens

Xbox Series X is getting a higher resolution dashboard for 4K displays, and certain Xbox Insiders can start testing it out today.

While Xbox Series X can play 4K games and video content just fine, its dashboard has remained comparatively low-resolution - which may lead to a fuzzier look on the best gaming TVs that otherwise make your games look great. The latest update for Xbox Insiders who are part of the Alpha Skip-Ahead ring will add a new "increased resolution UI" specifically for Xbox Series X, which should help finally bring the console UI experience up to par with its games.

The Xbox Wire release notes studiously avoid calling this a 4K dashboard update, so it may be the case that the max resolution of the dashboard falls somewhere between HD and 4K. Either way, it should be a welcome improvement for pixel-counting players. It also looks like this update won't be available on Xbox Series S, at least in preview. The more affordable console can output 4K video content just fine but not 4K games, so this discrepancy isn't a huge surprise.

The update will start rolling out to Alpha Skip-Ahead testers at 2 pm PDT / 5 pm EDT / 10 pm BST today, and become mandatory for testers to use 13 hours later.

The update also makes fixes "to properly reflect local languages" across Xbox, though Microsoft is warning that you may still see some "odd" text popping up here or there. Weird stuff happening every now and then is what testing is for, after all.

Check out our guide to Xbox Series X stock if you're still looking to grab a console for yourself.