Tech giant Microsoft has announced that the Xbox's April system update would commence today. The update adds a series of new features designed to improve the user's Xbox One experience.

The full list of features, as per this official blog post at Major Nelson, is as follows:

Party chat improvements – Additional icons and notifications within the party chat experience to help you understand your connection and microphone status. The party app will help you get your microphone enabled and show you when privacy settings or networking issues are blocking communication with particular party members.

Game hub links – You'll see activity feed items when any of your friends follow a game, and you'll also be able to get back to a game's hub from activity feed posts related to the game – including feed items about the game's achievements, game clips and screenshots.

Achievement notifications – With this update, you'll also see the achievement's description in the notification so you know what you did to earn this achievement without having to open the achievements app.

What's On – The What's On area is now available for Xbox One users in the U.S., Canada, and the UK. In it, you'll find links to popular videos, games, movies, TV shows, game broadcasts and clips, along with Trending TV shows if you have configured OneGuide for your Xbox One console.

Aside from these features, Microsoft teased that even more features would be included in a future system update. This includes the previously announced Voice Messaging feature that was targeted for inclusion in the latest update but has been delayed for now due to the company's desire to conduct more in-depth testing.

As per this informational video from Microsoft, the Voice Messages feature (along with dedicated party chat servers) would be released when the design team feels it is ready. The design team did not disclose specifics on why the two features have been delayed except to say that user feedback from their testing group guided their decision.

Voice Messaging has been one of the most requested features from the Xbox community. The feature is intended to allow Xbox One users to communicate via audio messages to fellow Xbox One and Xbox 360 users. The feature, as currently designed, allows users to send messages even while playing in-game or watching a movie.

For now users, will have to settle for the April system update, which should be available for download across multiple territories worldwide.