With Intelligent Terminal, Microsoft is reinventing the Windows terminal
Microsoft unveils Intelligent Terminal, an experimental feature that brings AI agents directly into the Windows 11 shell. It supports GitHub Copilot, Claude Code, and other ACP-compatible agents, detects errors, and suggests fixes with a single click, streamlining developer workflows.
The good old terminal has been through a bit of a comeback in recent months, largely thanks to the popularity of coding tools like Claude Code.
The terminal itself, however, hasn’t changed all that much since the days when it was the only way to interact with a computer.
Warp and others have made some inroads recently, often in combination with agentic coding tools, and on Tuesday, Microsoft revealed it is also considering how to reinvent the terminal in Windows 11 with the launch of the Intelligent Terminal.
Developers will be able to have their “favorite agent, whether that’s GitHub Copilot, Claude Code, Codex, or others” help them right in the terminal.
This is an experimental release, but as the name implies, the main idea here is to bring agents directly into the shell. Microsoft is starting with its own GitHub Copilot, but you can bring any Agent Communication Protocol (ACP) compatible agents into the mix.
As Jatinder Mann, a partner director of product management at Microsoft, tells The New Stack, this means developers will be able to have their “favorite agent, whether that’s GitHub Copilot, Claude Code, Codex, or others” help them right in the terminal.
“You’re in a terminal, you hit an error, you copy it, you switch to your chat window with your favorite agent, you paste it, explain the context, get an answer, and you switch back. That feels broken.” —Jatinder Mann of Microsoft
As Mann notes, a large part of a developer’s workflow may be in the terminal, but that’s not always where the coding agents live today. “You’re in a terminal, you hit an error, you copy it, you switch to your chat window with your favorite agent, you paste it, explain the context, get an answer, and you switch back. That feels broken,” Mann says.
What the Intelligent Terminal can do — similar to Warp — is to detect an error, for example, when you run a terminal command or test an application, and the developer only has to click a button for the agent to spin up and suggest fixes. It can do this because it understands the live state of the shell,
Since developers like to customize their work environment, that agent can appear in a background tab, side pane, or tat he bottom of the page. And for those who don’t want to deal with an agent at all and prefer to copy and paste from StackOverflow like it’s 2019, they can also completely turn the agent off, of course.
The post With Intelligent Terminal, Microsoft is reinventing the Windows terminal appeared first on The New Stack.