Customize the Start Menu in Windows 11 & 10: Size, Pins, Folders, Layout

To resize or rearrange the Start menu in Windows 11, open Settings > Personalization > Start. On current versions, after the September 2026 update, you can set Start menu size to Automatic, Small or Large, show or hide the Pinned, Recent and All sections, and choose a list, grid or category view for All apps. To change what is pinned, right-click any app and choose Pin to Start or Unpin from Start, drag pins to reorder them, and drop one pin on another to make a folder. On Windows 10, drag the top or right edge of Start to resize it. Here is the change most guides have not caught up with: for years Windows 11's Start menu could not be resized at all, which is why so many people installed third-party tools. The size setting is now built in, and the cleaner, safer route is to remove those tools and use it.

Ethan's aunt teaches piano, and her laptop's Start menu was a wall of icons she never used: trial games, a streaming app she had never opened, three different "get started" tips, and somewhere in the middle, the two apps she needed every day, her music notation program and her calendar. Every lesson began with a search. At Jake's shop he spent ten minutes with her: unpinning everything she did not recognize, pinning the notation app and calendar to the front, making a folder called "Lessons" for her sheet music tools, setting Start to the Small size, and turning off recommendations. Now Start opens to four icons she actually uses. That is where this page starts: every way to resize, rearrange and tidy Start and the taskbar on Windows 11 and 10, so it shows what you use and nothing else.

A Start menu that shows exactly the apps you use is one of the biggest small improvements you can make to a PC. It takes ten minutes, needs no downloads, and every change here is reversible, so there is no risk in experimenting.

Every Start menu setting, and where it lives

All Windows 11 paths start from Settings (Windows + I). Windows 10 paths do too, except the drag-to-resize, which happens on Start itself.

A ten-minute Start makeover

1. Open Start and right-click every pin you do not recognize or never use. Choose Unpin from Start, or Uninstall for trial apps and games you will never open.
2. Open All apps, find your daily apps, and choose Pin to Start for each. Use Move to front so they sit in the first row.
3. Drag related apps onto each other to make folders, and name them by purpose.
4. In Settings > Personalization > Start, choose a Start menu size and turn off recommendations for tips and new apps.
5. Turn on the folders you want next to the Power button.
6. Do the same on the taskbar: unpin icons you never click, pin your top three apps, and hide Widgets or Search if you do not use them.
7. Copy start2.bin to a safe place as a backup of your new layout.

Resize the Windows 11 Start menu

1. Open Settings with Windows + I, or type ms-settings:personalization-start into the Run box (Windows + R).
2. Go to Personalization > Start.
3. Find Start menu size and choose Small, Large or Automatic.

Small gives a compact menu that covers less of the screen, good for laptops and for people who mostly search. Large shows more pinned apps at once without scrolling, good on big monitors. Automatic lets Windows choose based on your screen size. The size setting changes the panel, not the icons; icon size follows your display Scale, which our guide to icon and text size explains.

If you do not see Start menu size, your PC has not received the September 2026 update or later for Windows 11 24H2 or 25H2, or it is on 26H2 waiting for the feature to roll out. Install updates from Windows Update. On older builds, the closest options were the Layout choices More pins, Default and More recommendations, which change how much space pins get, not the overall size.

Show or hide sections: Pinned, Recent, Recommended, All

The redesigned Windows 11 Start lets you decide which sections appear. On the same Personalization > Start page:

• Pinned: the apps you chose to keep in Start.
• Recent (called Recommended on older versions): recently added apps, recently opened files, and suggestions.
• All: every installed app, in list, grid or category view.

Switch off a section to remove it entirely. Below the section switches are finer controls: Show recently added apps, Show most used apps, Show recommended files in Start, recent files in File Explorer, and items in Jump Lists, and Show recommendations for tips, shortcuts, new apps, and more. Turning off the last one removes promotional suggestions, which most people never want. Turning off recent files is a good privacy choice on shared PCs, because otherwise anyone opening Start sees what you worked on.

Change the All apps view: list, grid or categories

The All apps section offers three views on current Windows 11 versions:

• Category: apps grouped automatically into categories such as Productivity, Creativity, Games and Utilities, with your most-used apps in each group shown first.
• Grid: all apps as icons in alphabetical order, compact and quick to scan.
• List: the classic alphabetical list with names, easiest when you know what you are looking for.

Switch views with the view option at the top of the All section. Category view is helpful on PCs with many apps; list view is the most predictable and the easiest for people who rely on a screen reader. Whichever you choose, typing the first letters of an app's name after pressing the Windows key is still the fastest way to find anything.

Pin, unpin, reorder and group apps in Start

Pin and unpin

• Pin: right-click an app in All apps or in search results and choose Pin to Start. It appears at the end of your pins.
• Unpin: right-click a pinned app and choose Unpin from Start. The app stays installed; only the shortcut is removed.
• Move to front: right-click a pin and choose Move to front to bring it to the first position.
• Uninstall: right-click and choose Uninstall to remove an app completely, which is the fastest way to clear preinstalled trials.

Reorder and make folders

Drag a pin to a new position to reorder. Drag one pin on top of another to create a folder; drop more pins into it to add them. Click a folder to open it, then click its name to rename it, such as Work, Lessons or Games. Drag a pin out of a folder to remove it; a folder with one app left disappears automatically.

Folders keep the first page short. Put your four to eight most-used apps as individual pins, and group the rest by purpose. That is exactly what made Ethan's aunt's Start useful again.

Pin folders and websites

Start can pin more than apps. Right-click a folder in File Explorer and choose Pin to Start to keep, say, your Documents or a project folder one click away. Websites can be pinned from Edge or Chrome; our guide to pinning websites to Start and the taskbar shows how.

What the right-click menu offers

Options vary by app type: Store apps show App settings, desktop programs show Open file location and Run as administrator.

Jump Lists: recent files from Start and the taskbar

Right-click a pinned app on the taskbar, or many apps in Start, and you see a Jump List: recent files and common tasks for that app, such as recent documents in Word or frequent sites in a browser. Pin a file inside a Jump List to keep it there permanently, which is a fast way to reopen a document you use every day. Jump Lists draw on the same history as Start's recent files, so the setting Show recommended files in Start, recent files in File Explorer, and items in Jump Lists controls them too. Turning it off empties Jump Lists, which is a privacy plus on shared PCs and a convenience loss elsewhere.

Remove preinstalled apps safely

Many new PCs come with trial software, games and promotional apps pinned to Start. Removing them makes Start tidier and frees space.

• From Start: right-click the app and choose Uninstall.
• From Settings: Settings > Apps > Installed apps, sort by install date or size, and use the three dots to uninstall.
• From Terminal: winget list shows installed apps, and winget uninstall --name "App Name" removes one.

Some built-in apps cannot be removed because Windows depends on them, and their Uninstall option is grayed out. Leave those alone; scripts that force-remove built-in packages can break Start, Settings or updates later. If you are unsure what an app is, search for its name before removing it. Trial antivirus apps deserve a note: uninstall them only after confirming Windows Security is on, so the PC is never left unprotected.

Folders next to the Power button

Windows 11 can show shortcuts to common folders and Settings beside the Power button at the bottom of Start, such as Settings, File Explorer, Documents, Downloads, Music, Pictures, Videos, Network and your user folder. Turn them on under Settings > Personalization > Start > Folders. They make Start a launch pad for places as well as apps, and they are a nice alternative to pinning folders. On Windows 10, the same option is under Start > Choose which folders appear on Start, and our guide to hiding folders and icons in Start covers it.

Colors and dark mode for Start and the taskbar

Start follows Windows' color mode. Under Settings > Personalization > Colors, choose Dark or Light, or Custom to set Windows and apps separately. To give Start and the taskbar your accent color, choose an accent color on the same page and turn on Show accent color on Start and taskbar. That option is only available when the Windows mode is Dark; in Light mode it is grayed out, which confuses many people. Transparency effects, on the same page, give Start its frosted-glass look and can be turned off for a solid background. Our guide to changing the color of Start and the taskbar has more.

Pin, unpin and resize on the taskbar

Start and the taskbar work together, and tidying one usually means tidying the other.

• Pin to taskbar: right-click an app in Start and choose Pin to taskbar, or right-click its icon on the taskbar while it is running and choose Pin to taskbar.
• Unpin from taskbar: right-click the icon and choose Unpin from taskbar. The app stays installed.
• Reorder: drag taskbar icons left or right.
• Remove built-in buttons: Search, Task View and Widgets can be hidden under Settings > Personalization > Taskbar > Taskbar items.
• Alignment: set Taskbar alignment to Left under Taskbar behaviors to put Start in the corner like Windows 10.

On Windows 11, the taskbar's height cannot be dragged. The Show smaller taskbar buttons option under Taskbar behaviors makes it smaller, and on current builds also reduces its height. Our guides to pinning apps to the taskbar and moving the taskbar to the top or side cover the rest.

Windows 10: resize Start, tiles and groups

Windows 10's Start menu is resized by dragging. Hover over the top edge or the right edge until the cursor becomes a double arrow, then drag. You can make it taller, wider, or both, up to most of the screen.

• Tile sizes: right-click a tile, choose Resize, and pick Small, Medium, Wide or Large.
• Groups: drag tiles into groups, then click above a group to name it.
• Live tiles: right-click a tile, then More, Turn live tile off, to stop animated content.
• Show more tiles: under Settings > Personalization > Start, this setting widens each column.
• Full-screen Start: the Use Start full screen option there turns Start into a full-screen launcher, handy on touchscreens.
• Taskbar height: right-click the taskbar, clear Lock the taskbar, then drag its top edge to make it taller. Lock it again afterward.

Windows 10 no longer receives new Start features, so its options stay as they are. If you move to Windows 11, tiles and groups do not carry over; you will pin your apps again in Windows 11's simpler style.

Windows 10 Start will not resize?

If dragging the edge does nothing on Windows 10, check three things. Tablet mode makes Start full screen and ignores resizing; turn it off from the Action Center. Use Start full screen under Personalization > Start does the same on a desktop; turn it off. And very small screens limit how far Start can stretch. If none apply and Start still refuses, restarting Windows Explorer from Task Manager usually restores normal behavior.

Getting more from Start folders

Folders are the best tool for a tidy Start, and a few habits make them better. Name folders by what you do, not by app type: "Bills" beats "Finance apps". Keep each folder to a handful of apps, because a folder of twenty is just another crowded list. Put the app you use most from each folder first inside it, since the folder's icon previews its first few apps. And remember that folders can mix things: a "Taxes" folder can hold a spreadsheet app, a pinned folder of documents and a pinned website. Any app or pinned item can live in a folder.

Pin Control Panel, tools and settings

Start can pin classic tools too. Press the Windows key, type Control Panel, right-click the result and choose Pin to Start. The same works for Command Prompt, Terminal, Disk Cleanup, Task Manager and other tools you open often. For Settings pages, our guide to opening Settings shows how to make desktop shortcuts to any page with ms-settings addresses, which you can then pin to Start as well.

For tools that need administrator rights, such as Terminal for system repairs, pin the normal version and use right-click, Run as administrator, when needed, rather than creating a shortcut that always runs elevated. It keeps everyday use safer and still saves the trip through search. A small "Tools" folder in Start holding Control Panel, Terminal, Task Manager and Device Manager is a tidy home for all of them, and keeps them off your main row of daily apps.

Three Start setups that work

Minimal. Small size, Pinned section only with six to eight apps, recommendations off, folders next to Power for Documents and Downloads. You search for anything else. It is clean, fast and private.

Organized. Large size, Pinned with a row of daily apps plus folders by purpose, All in category view, recent files on. Good for people with many apps who browse rather than search.

Family-friendly. Large size for bigger targets, a few large pins for the apps each person uses, recommendations and recent files off for privacy, and a folder per family member if several people share an account (better still, separate accounts).

The account menu in Start

Clicking your name or picture at the bottom-left of Start opens the account menu: change account settings, lock the PC, sign out, and switch to another user on PCs with several accounts. Windows also uses this area for account-related notifications, such as reminders to back up or to finish setting up your Microsoft account. If you find those reminders intrusive, turn off Show account-related notifications under Settings > Personalization > Start. The Power button beside it holds Sleep, Shut down and Restart, plus Hibernate if you have enabled it in Power Options.

Start for touch screens, big displays and low vision

Different people need different Starts. On a touchscreen, choose the Large size for bigger targets and keep pins few, so taps land where intended. On a large monitor, Large shows more pins without scrolling, and the grid view of All apps uses the space well. For low vision, raise the display Scale or Text size, which enlarges Start's icons and labels, and use the list view, which has the clearest text. Screen-reader users benefit from short, distinctive folder names and from list view, where Narrator reads every app name in order. Our guide to icon and text size covers Scale and Text size.

Search or browse? Using Start efficiently

The most efficient Start users do not scroll at all. They press the Windows key and type the first few letters of what they want, such as "cal" for Calculator or "exc" for Excel, then press Enter. Search also finds settings ("dark mode"), files and folders. Pins and folders are for the handful of apps you open many times a day; search is for everything else. That is why a short pinned list works better than a long one: it is not a catalog, it is a speed dial.

Start and taskbar shortcuts power users love

• Windows + number keys open the taskbar's pinned apps in order: Windows + 1 opens the first, Windows + 2 the second. Pin your top apps in the first slots, and they are one keystroke away.
• Windows + X opens the power-user menu: Terminal, Task Manager, Settings, Device Manager, Disk Management and shut-down options.
• Drag from All apps to the desktop to create a desktop shortcut, if you prefer desktop icons.
• Shift + click a taskbar icon opens a new window of that app, even if one is already open.
• Ctrl + Shift + click a taskbar icon opens the app as administrator, after the usual permission prompt.
• Type, don't click. Windows key, then a few letters, then Enter, beats any menu.

Reset Start to its default layout

If you want to start over, the simplest way is manual: unpin everything, then pin your apps fresh. On Windows 11, Start keeps its pins in the start2.bin file described above. Renaming that file, for example to start2.old, then ending the Start task in Task Manager, makes Start rebuild its default pins on most versions. Keep the renamed file, so you can put it back if you change your mind. This touches only your account's layout; apps, files and other users are unaffected. On managed work PCs, the layout comes from IT policy, and any reset returns to the organization's pins.

Pins you cannot remove on a work PC

If some pins on a work or school PC cannot be unpinned or moved, your organization deployed them with a layout policy. They usually include company apps and tools IT wants everyone to find. You can still add your own pins and folders around them on most configurations, and change the size and sections unless those are managed too. If a mandatory pin is something you never use, ask IT; layouts are often tailored by department.

Managed layouts can also reset your own changes at each sign-in if IT has locked them, which makes it look as though Start "forgets" your pins. If your pins vanish every morning on a work PC but stay on your home PC, that is the policy at work rather than a fault, and it is worth asking whether personal pins are allowed on top of the company layout.

Too many taskbar icons: the overflow menu

When more apps are pinned or open than the taskbar can fit, Windows 11 adds an overflow button, three dots at the end of the app icons, that holds the rest. It keeps the taskbar from becoming unusable, but icons in the overflow take two clicks instead of one. If your favorite apps keep ending up there, unpin rarely used ones, turn on Show smaller taskbar buttons so more fit, or move the taskbar's alignment to Left, which frees space on wide screens. The same logic applies as in Start: a short, chosen list beats a long, accidental one.

Start setups for school and work

A few patterns help students and office workers in particular.

• A folder per course or project in Pinned, holding the apps and pinned folders for it, so each subject is one click away.
• Pinned folders for the current term's or quarter's documents, replaced when it ends.
• Recent files on for people who reopen the same documents daily, and off on shared lab PCs.
• The taskbar for meetings: Teams or Zoom pinned in the first slot, so Windows + 1 joins the call.
• Search for everything else, so Start never turns into a list of every app the school or company installed.

What changed in Start with the latest Windows 11 versions

Start has changed more in 2025 and 2026 than in the previous years combined. The All apps list moved onto the main Start page with list, grid and category views; sections can be shown or hidden individually; the Recommended section became Recent and focuses on recent files and recently installed apps; and the Start menu size setting arrived with the September 2026 update for 24H2 and 25H2. Windows 11 26H2 includes the redesigned Start as standard. If a guide or video shows a Start menu that looks different from yours, check your version, as our guide to finding your Windows version explains, before assuming something is wrong.

Why a short Start menu works better

It is tempting to pin everything, so nothing is ever more than a click away. In practice the opposite happens: a crowded Start makes every app slower to find, because your eyes have to scan dozens of icons each time. In everyday use, people find things fastest among a small number of familiar positions. Six to eight pins in fixed places become muscle memory within a week. That is why the makeover above begins with unpinning, not pinning.

A short Start also ages better. Apps you installed for one project or one trial pile up silently; a monthly glance at your pins, unpinning anything you have not opened in weeks, keeps Start honest. And for anyone who helps family members with their PCs, a short, consistent Start is the single biggest reducer of "where did it go?" phone calls, because the same few icons sit in the same few places every time.

Widgets: the other board beside Start

Windows 11's Widgets board, opened with Windows + W or the weather icon at the left of the taskbar, shows news, weather, calendar and other small cards. It is separate from Start, and some people find its news feed distracting. Customize it from the board's settings, or hide the button entirely under Settings > Personalization > Taskbar > Taskbar items > Widgets. Hiding the button does not affect Start, and a tidier taskbar makes the Start button easier to find, especially for new users.

If you like Widgets but not the news, open the board, use its settings to turn off the feed, and keep only the cards you want, such as weather and calendar. Hovering over the weather icon opens the board on many setups, which surprises people; the board's settings include an option to open it only on click. Widgets do not use much in the way of resources when closed, so keeping them is a matter of taste rather than performance.

Should you use a third-party Start menu tool?

Programs that replace or restyle Start were popular because Windows 11 lacked options such as resizing, a left-aligned taskbar and a classic list. Most of those options now exist in Windows itself. Third-party tools also patch parts of Windows that monthly updates change, which is a common cause of Start and taskbar crashes after updates; our guide to fixing a Start menu that stops working explains how. If you use one and like it, keep it updated before installing big Windows updates. If you only installed it for resizing or left alignment, try the built-in options and uninstall it.

Back up your Start layout

After investing time in a tidy Start, it is worth protecting. On Windows 11, your pins and folders are stored in a file named start2.bin in %LocalAppData%\Packages\Microsoft.Windows.StartMenuExperienceHost_cw5n1h2txyewy\LocalState. Copy it somewhere safe. If a profile problem or update resets your pins, putting the copy back, while Start is not open, and signing out and in usually restores them. It is not an official feature, so also take a screenshot of your Start as a simple record. On Windows 10, the PowerShell command Export-StartLayout -Path C:\Temp\layout.xml saves the tile layout.

Start menus on shared and family PCs

Start layouts are per user account. Each person signing in to Windows with their own account gets their own pins, folders, size and recommendations. That is the best way to share a PC: everyone's Start shows their apps and their recent files, and nobody's tidying undoes anyone else's. If several people share one account, their recent files appear to each other in Start's Recent section, which is a privacy reason to turn recent files off, or better, to give each person an account.

Creating an account takes a couple of minutes under Settings > Accounts > Other users, and family members can be set up with Microsoft accounts so their Start, settings and files follow them to other PCs. Children's accounts can be managed through Microsoft Family Safety, which also controls which apps they can open from Start. For a guest who needs the PC for an afternoon, a separate local account keeps your Start, and your recent files, out of view.

For IT admins: managing Start layouts

Pinned apps. Windows 11 Start pins are managed with the ConfigureStartPins policy, which takes a JSON list of pinned apps. Export a reference layout from a configured PC with Export-StartLayout -Path C:\Temp\start.json, then deploy the JSON through Intune's settings catalog or the matching Group Policy. Users can still add their own pins unless you lock the layout.

Sections and recommendations. Policies under Start Menu and Taskbar can hide the Recommended section, recently added apps, most used apps and the All apps list, and remove items such as the power button for kiosks. Check the available settings for your Windows version, because several arrived in later Windows 11 releases.

Taskbar pins. Taskbar pins are set with a taskbar layout XML through policy, separately from Start. Test layouts on a pilot device first; an invalid file can leave Start or the taskbar empty.

Customizing the Start menu: frequently asked questions

A month later, Ethan's aunt said the change she noticed most was not speed but calm. Opening Start no longer felt like walking into a cluttered room. Her two daily apps were first, her lesson tools were in one folder, and nothing on the screen was trying to sell her anything. That is what customizing Start is really for. Windows ships it set up for everyone, which means for no one in particular. Ten minutes of unpinning, pinning and grouping makes it set up for you, and a quick monthly tidy keeps it that way long after the first clean-up.

Revision note. Written October 2, 2026, rewriting our 2016 guide with the Start options added in 2025 and 2026. May your Start menu open to exactly what you need.