Windows 11 is getting a new start menu. EDIT: this replaces the "all apps" page by default, not the home screem

bunch of fucking interface designers so deep into their shit that they're forcing everyone to chase the UX meta and play ranked competitive UI when 90% of everyone is just trying to be casuals and play what they're accustomed to so they can unwind at the end of the day

"yes well you see moving every interface element on your computer to a totally new location results in a 0.0001% improvement in the average user's workflow, therefore: bite the pillow, changes are coming, we're the experts you dumb schlubs!"

I actually liked how the start menu works in Win10, with the rearrangeable/resizable tiles you can put wherever and categorize however you want. That was closer to what's pictured here, but this is still worse.

How do I get that back?

(...I actually liked Windows 8's Start Screen as well. I understand this puts me in the minority. Everything else about the Win8 UI was a five alarm dumpster fire, but I liked having a big colorful full screen app launcher that could be arranged in any way you wanted.)

I can’t wait!

Lol jk I don’t use Windows garbage

Not sure when it started, but I've already noticed some Start Menu fuckery with just the 'Sign Out' portion. I believe you previously just clicked on your profile picture/name and the options for signing out were right there. They've "helpfully" hidden those options now beneath a ••• menu for no apparent reason. I was a little aggravated when I first noticed it because it seemingly changed out of nowhere. Not a huge change, but it requires one more click to do now.

I guess it’s better but it should be manual not automatic and it doesn’t fix the “can’t be placed at the top of the screen” bug

Oh it's good they have the "Messages" and "Calls" buttons right there for easy access since so many people message or call my desktop PC.

they need to bring back a windows 2000 classic style start menu

Why do they keep changing the thing? Linux mint Cinnamon desktop has kept the same look and I appreciate that.

This is why I use Fedora for everything except gaming and MS Office.

Looks like they're going full speed ahead towards their mobile/tablet/TV/PC unishittification.

I believe they want you to seamlessly transfer stuff from device to device, regardless of which, where and why.

I love how, as a Linux user, Windows never adds anything that makes me regret leaving.

Thanks, I hate it

Had to spin up a virtual windows machine the other day and was just honestly appalled at how bad the desktop experience is these days

I'm really enjoying my Mint 22 experience, the only downside is that I have to switch to windows to play Once Human.

Another shitty clone of the KDE launcher

That looks pretty ugly. I'm not really a fan of trying to make computers look more like phones but I think I'm in the minority there. Oh well, I never use the start menu anyways, I only have a few programs and they're all pinned to my taskbar.

Ugh, fine Microsoft. I'll finish my migration to Linux this weekend.

I for one dont see the fault in the design itself. Geniuenly looks like something usefull for pepole that use lots of tools.

If not for the fact that it already exist in the goddam pinned section in start menu and it replaces all items menu. Whyyy? These are not replecable by each other.

It looks like the little windows you'd use to organise your applications in Windows 3.1

With more room for ads, I hope?!

Looks even worse than the one they had before

I genuinely in 2024 I don't see why would anyone want to use any Microsoft product. They (alongside with Google) present themselves as malicious companies that only care about user data and providing user notorious ads.

Interesting design but I've literally never used the start menu for the past 5 years I think. I only ever press the windows key and then type the name of the app I need.

Every update with these new UI changes seems to increase empty wasted space each time

Clearly they learned nothing from windows 8...

They are removing the only really useful part of the start menu. Fucking genious.

It's not that new if it's been a thing on Windows 8.

Uhhh! Ahhh! How about the mouse pointer? Make it AI! Nobody likes the little ⬆️ arrow following all the stupid motions. Plus when you loose it and you had wanted to click somewhere, where the fuck is it? Make it jiggle around! That's it! A jiggling mouse pointer that is composed of the two letters AI and jiggles around randomly is surely something everyone could use!

I was worried this was going to be a problem when I bought new Windows 11 laptops for my octogenerian parents to use. Fortunately, it turns out they never even knew how to use the start menu on earlier versions of Windows - they always just used the desktop or toolbar shortcuts I had set up for them. "The more things change, the more they never were in the first place".

ha, oh look another revision no one asked for.

i had to use this recently, and its all kinds of useless now. the 'search' didnt find my installed app, the 'all apps' list is a click or two in, and then absurdly inefficiently styled.. the win98 start menu was easier for me to navigate.

Win 11 still looks ugly.

My main desktop OS in Linux. But on my Windows 11 VM I'm using StartAllBack app. It makes start menu, task panel to be normal again, like it was in Windows 7 and XP.

I love how modern UI = eating up as much space as possible, while displaying as little information as possible. Glad I can watch this shitshow from afar.

Oh cool, good to see the power button is still on the other side of the fucking menu. You know, the thing that I'm clicking on 90% of the time I'm opening the Start Menu? Why have that easily reachable like in past versions of Windows? Silly me I guess.

They want to be as sleek as apple but it comes off as an old man trying to be hip

Oh for fucks sake, auto categorization is one of the thing I dreaded the most on iOS because it's almost always incorrect and it doesn't fit my usage at all. Hopefully it will be possible to disable this crap.

No wonder why alot of people are on windows 10

What the fuck is the point of the start button in the middle? Like, did they forget why the space to the right of it even exists.

Looks like someone at Microsoft saw someone's iPad and went "That's what we need! Icons in boxes that need an extra click to be used!" and their MBA boss figures they'll get a bonus for "increasing user engagement" by making everything take two actions instead of one now.

Sigh.

Holy hell, does every Windows 11 device require touch-based input soon or what?

Uggggh fucking whhhhhy.

I don’t even use Windows and I have to put up with this shit. My parents are going to call and ask how and why they have to use this new thing.

What was gained from this exercise in self-lobotomization? Pick a design language and stick to it.

Stirring the pot like this is driving away even enterprise users. My last org only approved Macs and Chromebooks because we didn’t want to deal with the headaches that windows brought. Imagine saying that statement 10 years ago!

Amazing! Reading this headline made my bazzite partition grow by 2 whole disk drives!

I was just pissed at my PC for "Update and Shutdown" and returning to my PC with it at the lock screen. I think this might be enough for me to leave windows.

Edit: on my gaming PC. Everything else is already KDE Neon or ubuntu.

Another 500k lines of new code? Yay more bloat!

linux folks just watching

Oh, dang. Laughing in KDE Plasma.

not the home screem

if had to use windows at home i'ld screem too.

not too surprised they didn't change that.

Looks like a welcome change, assuming you can edit everything fully.

I disagree. Microsoft is learning its lesson. It's just that the vast majority of people are teaching Microsoft that its actions are perfectly acceptable, or, at the very least, not totally unacceptable... so it continues.

Microsoft can not stop fucking up. I have to wonder what the turnaround is like on their UI teams that every god damn version needs a complete rework.

After Microsoft Edge decided to import all my chrome passwords and data I decided to get rid of windows as much as possible.

Well that looks like pure garbage. Glad I no longer have to deal with it.

Cool, will this one work, or will it still go unresponsive and/or fail to find the app called the exact thing you typed?

Linux and gnome pretty much gtfo of the way for me - as an OS should. I used to care a lot about what Microsoft did, now I couldn’t care less - F em

Thanks, I still hate it

So is Nadella redesigning all this stuff? Because it certainly doesn’t look like someone who is familiar with UI is doing it. Reminds me of when the CEO of Yahoo decided she could create a new logo in Corel Draw one night.

These people are stupid fucks.

Not my home screem!

oh yeah, now one can accidentally close the Start menu by clicking in the gap between the panels.

Windows 11 gets a new all apps screen in the start menu*

i guess they couldn't find a way to not make it look fucking awful

Can write reskin Windows 11 to look like 95/98?

Cuz that would be cool. Just hide all the bullshit. Have a functional desktop again.

It's awful, but KDE will copy it one day.

IF the categorization works well, and that's a big if, I like it.

And if the categorization isn't absolutely perfect, you can bet everyone will be clamoring to be allowed to customize it or disable it.

Looks like MacOS and various Linux distros had a deformed, illegitimate child.

I like the phone link integration. I've never been a fan out auto-populating app folders though.

Where's all the ads though? They've gotta be thinking about turning one of the folders into a recommended apps folder or something dumb. They'll sneak something in somewhere.

It's not as bad as people here are making it out to be. It actually might even be an improvement. It's only for the all apps tab, and it organizes apps by their purpose, and you don't have to click the folder to expand it and then click the icon, as you can just click the icon and it will launch it. I've been using Windows 11 since it came out, and the all apps tab is something I have barely ever used. All my important stuff is neatly organized in one single tab of my home star menu screen, and anything that is not there I'll just look it up with search.

This is a new layout for the "all apps" section. It is toggle able, so if you don't like it you don't need to use it. I will give it a try but I don't often go into all apps anyway.

So much negativity here.

I DON'T LIKE CHANGE

People still use the start menu?

I just use the search bar and type in the app I'm wanting to run

I like the Phone Companion bar too. The folder grid is reminiscent of Windows 8 and is a nod to iOS… I guess haters gonna hate, but this seems like a nice improvement.