diff --git a/NEWS.md b/NEWS.md
index 510c0997de68f..2cdb0d431bda4 100644
--- a/NEWS.md
+++ b/NEWS.md
@@ -24,10 +24,16 @@ Command-line option changes
 
 * In Linux and Windows, `--threads=auto` now tries to infer usable number of CPUs from the
   process affinity which is set typically in HPC and cloud environments ([#42340]).
+* The `--threads` command-line option now accepts `auto|N[,auto|M]` where `M` specifies the
+  number of interactive threads to create (`auto` currently means 1) ([#42302]).
 
 Multi-threading changes
 -----------------------
 
+* `Threads.@spawn` now accepts an optional first argument: `:default` or `:interactive`.
+  An interactive task desires low latency and implicitly agrees to be short duration or to
+  yield frequently. Interactive tasks will run on interactive threads, if any are specified
+  when Julia is started ([#42302]).
 
 Build system changes
 --------------------