Windows 11 Start Menu & Taskbar
— Make It Yours

Your computer's front door shouldn't belong to Microsoft

The Start menu and the taskbar are where every single thing on your computer begins — and new PCs arrive with that space rented out: a news feed disguised as a weather button, a search bar the size of a bread loaf, “recommended” apps nobody recommended, and a Start button that moved to the middle after thirty years in the corner. Meanwhile the three programs you actually use are buried.

Here's the part that matters: Windows 11 has a plain on/off switch for nearly all of it, and none of them cost a dime or require anything technical. Microsoft has even been rolling out a redesigned Start menu through the 24H2 and 25H2 updates — one scrolling page, and the Recommended section can finally disappear completely. This guide walks every switch, one at a time, in plain English.

Pin what you use — the highest-value skill on this page

1. Press the Windows key (the one with the flag) and type the program's name.
2. Right-click the program in the results.
3. Choose Pin to Start (puts it in the Start menu grid) or Pin to taskbar (always visible at the bottom of the screen).
4. In the Start menu, click and hold a pin to drag it where you want — put your favorites in the top-left corner.
5. Drag one pin onto another to make a folder (“Games,” “Photos stuff”).

Unpin the clutter — nothing gets uninstalled

Right-click any pin you never use and choose Unpin from Start or Unpin from taskbar. A pin is only a shortcut — like a sticky note pointing at the program. Remove the note and the program stays right where it was, in the apps list. Two ruthless minutes here does more for a crowded Start menu than anything else.

Put the Start button back on the left

1. Right-click an empty spot on the taskbar and choose Taskbar settings.
2. Click Taskbar behaviors to expand it.
3. Find Taskbar alignment and change “Center” to Left.
4. That's it — instant, and the corner is an easier mouse target than the middle ever was. While you're there, make sure “Automatically hide the taskbar” is Off — a vanishing taskbar is one of the most common problems I get called about.

Turn off the “Recommended” suggestions

1. Right-click the Start button and choose Settings, then Personalization, then Start.
2. Turn off “Show recently added apps.”
3. Turn off “Show recommended files in Start, recent files in File Explorer, and items in Jump Lists.”
4. Turn off “Show recommendations for tips, app promotions, and more” — this one is the advertisements.
5. Turn off “Show websites from your browsing history” if you see it.
6. These are separate switches — plenty of folks keep the recent-files list on and shut off only the promotions. On the newer Start menu design, turning them all off makes the whole Recommended section vanish.

Hide the widgets news feed and shrink the search box

• That weather readout in the corner is the Widgets button — brush it and a panel of news and celebrity headlines slides out. Right-click the taskbar > Taskbar settings > flip Widgets to Off.
• The wide search bar has four sizes: Search box, icon and label, icon only, or Hide — same Taskbar settings page, under “Search.” I usually set “icon only.”
• Hiding the box loses nothing: press the Windows key and just start typing — same search, no box needed. Honestly a faster habit anyway.
• The Task View button (two overlapping squares) has an off switch there too, if you never use it.

If your Start menu suddenly looks different — you're not imagining it

Microsoft has been rolling a redesigned Start menu out to Windows 11 PCs through the normal updates, computer by computer. Everything now sits on one scrolling page — pins on top, the full A-to-Z apps list below — and the apps list offers Category, Grid, or List views (List, the classic alphabetical column, is the one most folks I visit find easiest to read). Nothing was deleted; the furniture moved. Scroll down and your programs are all there.

One warning: skip the “Start menu fixer” downloads

Search the web for “fix Windows 11 Start menu” and you'll find free repair tools and taskbar cleaners. Many bundle junk; some carry worse. Everything they promise, the built-in switches above already do — for free. Same goes for ads inside the widgets feed shouting “Your PC is infected!” — those are ads, not Windows. Real Windows changes come through Windows Update, never through a pop-up or a download link.

What's in the 27-page PDF

• Why your Start menu changed after an update — the 24H2/25H2 redesign, explained calmly
• A guided tour of the taskbar and Start menu — what every button is, and whether it earns its spot
• Pinning to Start, step by step — plus folders, rearranging, and what I'd pin for most households
• Unpinning clutter safely — and how unpin differs from uninstall
• Turning off every “Recommended” switch, with the exact setting names
• Start layout choices: Show all pins by default, Category vs. Grid vs. List view, and the Phone Link panel
• Moving the Start button back to the left corner — and why corners beat centers
• Shrinking or hiding the search box while keeping search itself
• Widgets, Task View, the system tray, and the secret “show desktop” corner
• A one-page settings map: every switch in the guide, one table to dog-ear
• The scams that ride along — fake “fixer” downloads and pop-ups with phone numbers
• Kitchen-table Q&A, a plain-English glossary, and a fill-in cheat sheet recording YOUR setup

Why I wrote this

I see the same thing on house calls all over Portage County: someone apologizing for their own computer — “I know it's me” — while a screen full of buttons nobody asked for buries the two programs they actually use. It is not you. It's the defaults. An hour of free, reversible switches turns a rented-looking desktop into your own, and I wrote this guide so you can do it at the kitchen table, one page at a time, with nothing you can break. — Bill