The following video from Microsoft gives a good overview:

You can read a full explanation of the different standby states below, per Microsoft’s documentation. The idea is to provide much the same functionality as your smartphone, where your laptop will barely use any battery when the lid is closed but will jump straight into the OS with no delay once it’s opened again.Īlso known as the S0 low power model, Modern Standby feature lets the PC stay up to date and also lets it retain the ability to listen for wake words from digital assistants like Cortana. Providing an alternative for the sleep power mode, S3, Modern Standby is designed for modern chipsets to enable a near-instant on/off state. Modern Standby is an evolution of ‘Connected Standby’, a feature with its roots in Windows 8 and 8.1.