Microsoft to release Windows Autopatch with Enterprise E3 licensing

Windows Autopatch will keep Windows and Office software on enrolled endpoints up-to-date automatically

Microsoft Autopatch will help organizations to promptly apply Windows software updates, while reducing the risk of disruptions caused by side-effects of the patches themselves to involved or interconnected applications.

Autopatch will compensate the lack of an internal, multi-step patching verification process, that organizations would need to implement to test patches, before deploying them to all the endpoints.

Windows Autopatch will detect the variations among endpoints in an estate and dynamically create 4 testing rings. These rings are groups of devices that are representative of all the diversity in an enterprise.

If no issues are reported, the patches will be applied progressively to a broader scope. In case of problems, a roll-back can be applied:

Test ring - contains a minimum number of representative devices;
First ring - slightly larger, containing about 1% of all devices;
Fast ring - contains about 9% of endpoints;
Broad ring - contains all the remaining endpoint population.

In case of issues, Autopatch can 'Halt' deployment and updates won't move from ring to ring. The second features is the 'Rollback', where updates can be undone automatically. The third, is the 'Selectivity' feature, that allows portions of an update package to be passed on and portions that don't perform to target to be halted or rolled back selectively and automatically.

Windows Autopatch will be released to general availability, for Windows Enterprise E3 and E5 licenses, in July 2022.

The Microsoft article