The Windows 11 context menu has received a lot of criticism in recent years, and for good reason. Some people love it, while others aren’t too happy with its ever-changing appearance. Lately, the right-click context menu has become somewhat long, bloated, and cluttered, and it looks like Microsoft is ready to clean up house.
Several years after Windows 11, it feels like Microsoft is still taking one step forward but two steps back. Back in 2023, we talked about why we loved Windows 11’s context menu, but a lot has changed since then. All shortcut context menus in Windows 11 can be a bit confusing for those coming from Windows 10 and has caused users to find ways to restore the full menu. Howeverthe company recently realized that this important menu was in danger of getting out of control.
First spotted by Latest versions of WindowsA recent WinUI Community Call discussed the right-click context menu, noting that there are almost too many options these days, with many buttons and AI options. When you right-click on a file or folder in any application or Windows, the context menu is called context menu. And of course, it provides quick access to several useful actions, as well as relevant applications and commands. But unfortunately, this is getting way too long. Sometimes more is less.
This is a problem in almost every aspect of Windows 11, not just Windows apps. So what is the solution? Submenus inside the normal context menu.
It seems that Microsoft is preparing a new redesign and will introduce some sort of “context” menus. Basically, instead of a very long list every time you right-click, the system will try to recognize the content, show a few menu options, and some of these selections will have “secondary item” menus.
These new side menus will also vary depending on file type, which should make them much more useful. It looks like the change will appear first for WinUI-based apps, and we hope it will spread across all of Windows 11. That said, Microsoft didn’t mention the system as a whole during the call.
Essentially, once deployment begins, the right-click context menu should no longer be as large. Users won’t receive a long list of items, many of which are repetitive, but will hopefully see something friendlier and more concise. According to Microsoft developers, this new split context menu system aims to reduce clutter by more than 38%. In other words, menus are up to 38% shorter.
Unfortunately, we don’t know when this change will actually happen. The idea behind menu cleaning is still in the development phase.
Source: Latest version of Windows
