The past two weeks have featured some good news for Windows 11 users. Microsoft has added some handy new features that make using the operating system far less of a pain, and they're sure to be welcome additions for the people who need them the most.

However, as the updates rolled in, I started to think - shouldn't these features have been a part of Windows 11 from the very beginning? We're coming up to the operating system's third birthday, and some of these features really feel like they should have been there since day one. As such, here are three recent features that got added to Windows 11 that really shouldn't have been delayed three years.

1 Microsoft finally adds mouse scroll controls to Windows 11 after years of people using a Registry tweak

One toggle is all that was needed

For as long as I can remember, I've associated scrolling a mouse wheel upward to move a page up and scrolling it downward to move it down again. I never thought that people would want it to behave the other way around, but it turns out, the format has its fans.

You'd think that reversing the scroll wheel would be an easy task, and you'd be right. For years since Windows 11's release, people could make a quick and easy Registry edit to make the change. The Registry key was even called "FlipFlopWheel," which implies that Microsoft specifically coded in the ability to change scroll direction.

So, making it easier for people to toggle the mouse wheel direction sounds easy enough; add a toggle in the Settings app that flips the direction and you're good to go. Except, Microsoft kind of sat on this one toggle for a good three years now, and there doesn't seem to be any reason why it took so long. After all, the Registry key was there, and people could tweak it themselves.

2 Changing your power plan is no longer a PITA with the latest Windows 11 Dev build

More power to the power plans

For laptop users, a good power plan is essential. If you're not sure what they are, power plans are specific setups that dictate how the device utilizes its hardware. On PCs, you'll usually have a high-performance mode that uses more power to get things done faster, a power saver mode that sacrifices performance to use less power and a balanced plan that sits between the two.

Laptops also have the option to set a different plan for when you're plugged into the mains and when you're using battery power. So, you may want your laptop to be in high-performance mode regardless of if you're plugged in or on battery, but you can tell the system to turn off the screen after a shorter amount of idle time while on battery to save some power.

It's really convenient - or rather, it should be. See, Windows 11 had this weird issue where you can't set up both power plans at the same time. If you want to change what your laptop does while it's plugged in, it has to be plugged in. If you want to adjust how it acts when it's on battery, then it needs to be on battery. This creates an annoying situation where you have to unplug and re-plug your laptop from the mains to get both plans set up properly.

Fortunately, Microsoft is finally adding a patch that lets you change both whenever you want. But it really feels like it should have been there from day one.

3 Accessing your Android phone on Windows 11 is about to get a lot easier

Taking the pain out of grabbing files from your phone

Alright, so this one isn't like the first two entries. While those two felt more like simple but convenient tweaks that took way too long to come out, this is just a really cool feature that I honestly think should have been released alongside Windows 11.

Microsoft is working on a way that makes grabbing files on your phone a ton easier. The idea is that, once you attach your phone to your PC, you can open it up in File Explorer and interact with its file system like you would any other removable media.

Again, this isn't a case of a brainless feature that came out three years too late (or maybe it is - I don't know how complex it is to code something like this). However, I think having this level of native Android integration would have made it easier for Windows 10 users to swallow the bitter pill and upgrade to Windows 11. Windows 11 needed some killer features to convince the Windows 10 market to upgrade, and I feel it fell short on this front.

Better late than never

Honestly, while these features have been on the sidelines for far too long, it is good to see them finally get added to Windows 11. And given how we're almost a year away from Windows 10 falling out of support, Microsoft is going to need to make 11 as cozy as possible for everyone making the jump. Here's hoping that Microsoft adds some more features that Windows 10 users will demand from Windows 11.