Windows 11 Start menu ads are now rolling out to everyone
Windows 11 Start menu ads are now rolling out to everyone
A new Windows 11 update is rolling out this week.
Microsoft is starting to enable ads inside the Start menu on Windows 11 for all users. After testing these briefly with Windows Insiders earlier this month, Microsoft has started to distribute update KB5036980 to Windows 11 users this week, which includes “recommendations” for apps from the Microsoft Store in the Start menu.
Luckily you can disable these ads, or “recommendations” as Microsoft calls them. If you’ve installed the latest KB5036980 update then head into Settings > Personalization > Start and turn off the toggle for “Show recommendations for tips, app promotions, and more.” While KB5036980 is optional right now, Microsoft will push this to all Windows 11 machines in the coming weeks.
Microsoft’s move to enable ads in the Windows 11 Start menu follows similar promotional spots in the Windows 10 lock screen and Start menu. Microsoft also started testing ads inside the File Explorer of Windows 11 last year before disabling the experiment and saying the test was “not intended to be published externally.” Hopefully that experiment remains very much an experiment.
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"Tips and recommendations".
For years I had that turned on in Windoof 10 as it sounded like: "we see you're regularly doing X or having problem Y. Here is a way how to make X simpler and a solution for Y."
Instead it was nothing like that. It was literally nothing at all. Probably they just tried to shove some ads down my throat, which I luckily didn't see.
But it has become clear enough: it's not about helping users with useful tips and recommendations. It's about luring them into buying some stuff.
They can find new clever euphemisms, like EA did with their "surprise mechanics". But it is what it is: ads, digital noise, a waste of resources and probably one of the last incentives I needed to fully switch to a good Linux distro.
I used Windoof just for gaming anyway. And as I'm already working professionally with Linux, it will hardly be a miss.
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