Microsoft has officially released the new Windows 10 preview build for Windows Insiders, bringing several exciting features to the table.

Just a few days ago, on Jan. 21, Microsoft held its highly-anticipated Windows 10 event and revealed more details about the operating system, its features, and the consumer experience.

At the time, the company said it will release the new preview build for Windows Insiders within a week, but it apparently took just a couple of days. On Friday, Jan. 23, Microsoft officially announced the Windows 10 January Build for Windows Insiders was available. The software brings a number of neat features including Cortana, an improved Start menu, Continuum feature, and more.

The new build is 9926, but it will not include everything the company showed off at its Jan. 21 Windows 10 event.

"Not everything you saw on Wednesday is included in this new build. Much is still in-progress and we're getting it out to you as fast as we can - so you can try it out and give us feedback. Over the course of the next few builds, you will see us refine Windows 10 and continue to improve the experiences as well as quality and stability," Microsoft announced in a post on the official Windows blog.

Nevertheless, the new build does include the much-touted Cortana, Microsoft's digital personal assistant and answer to Apple's Siri and Google Now. This marks the first time such software expands beyond mobile and reaches the desktop, allowing users to set up reminders, check news, search for files, and perform various other such tasks.

"We're excited to include Cortana as an integrated part of the desktop in Windows 10. Cortana is one click away on the taskbar, helping you find the things you need while proactively bringing you information you care about. Cortana can help you search in Windows 10 for apps, settings, and files as well as searching the web. You can access Cortana with your voice by clicking the microphone icon, then speaking to set reminders or ask about weather, sports, finance and other content from Bing."

For the time being, Cortana is available only in English and only for the U.S., but Microsoft promised to work on improvements for future builds and add support for more languages in the future.

In addition to Cortana, the new build also brings some notable changes to the Start menu, which now allows users to expand in a full screen mode. For a 2-in-1 device, for instance, this could come particularly in handy.

"You'll see some big changes to the Start menu in this build, including the ability to expand to a full-screen experience. This really shines on 2-in-1 PCs when switching into Tablet Mode. You can also customize the color of your Start screen. A big change that you won't see is that we actually rebuilt Start in XAML, which is one type of code developers can use to build apps for Windows 10. The work on Start isn't done yet, and we'll have more changes that will show up in future builds including more personalization (and transparency!), drag and drop, Jump Lists, and the ability to resize the Start menu," Microsoft further touted.

The latest build further introduces a new Settings app, a new Windows Store in beta, new apps for photos and maps, and numerous other neat changes.

For more information, check out the sneak peak video below.