Microsoft Releases VS Code 1.137 with AI Agent Automations and Voice Mode
Microsoft has released Visual Studio Code version 1.137, introducing scheduled AI agent automations on hourly, daily, or weekly intervals, alongside an experimental Voice Mode for spoken interactions with coding agents. The release also includes Quick Chat workspace context conversion, direct GitHub Issue/PR views inside the Agents window, and an interactive editor pet companion. This update advances developer workflow automation by enabling background AI agents to perform routine tasks like bug searching and issue triage on a schedule without manual intervention. It highlights a growing industry movement toward hands-free, autonomous AI assistance embedded directly inside mainstream integrated development environments (IDEs). Automations can be configured via the `chat.automations.enabled` setting using preset or custom prompts, while Voice Mode requires `agents.voice.enabled` and supports push-to-talk shortcuts to interrupt or redirect working agents. Additionally, GitHub Issues and PRs can be viewed directly in the Agents window when using the GitHub Pull Requests extension with experimental flags enabled.
## BACKGROUND
Visual Studio Code is Microsoft's widely used code editor that heavily integrates AI capabilities through GitHub Copilot and custom agents. AI agents are autonomous software assistants that can analyze codebase files, run terminal commands, and solve complex programming tasks. Voice Mode extends traditional speech-to-text dictation into full two-way voice conversations with AI agents while they work.