A new year and life… No, it’s not a new life. 2024 and we have to continue talking about the Windows 11 Start menu (horrible in my opinion, if you allow the opinion). It seems unbelievable that we’ve had the same nonsense for over a decade, but that’s who we are. At least we have hope that we know we are not the only ones who think this way At Microsoft itself, even some bosses are not satisfied.

What can I tell you at the beginning that you don’t know? Microsoft introduced the Start menu in Windows 95 and improved it until it achieved a remarkable menu in Windows XP and an excellent menu with Windows 7. That’s where the disaster came from. Windows 8 simply did away with it in favor of a tiled display similar to the Windows Phone mobile system. On the PC, the usability was close to absolute zero, as it did not even have an available button to turn off or restart the computer. Criticism was fierce and Microsoft brought it back with Windows 8.1. It got better in Windows, but it was also below XP or 7. Much worse in Windows 11.

Users aren’t the only ones questioning the usefulness of the Windows 11 Start menu as designed, and we can at least be thankful that Microsoft is listening. It turns out that in response to one of many pleading comments to which was headed by sa “just fix the opening menu” to browse all apps, the head of Windows Mikhail Parakhin himself entered the debate: “It bothers me a lot too”promising “Make the Start menu great again”.

Parakhin’s candor is refreshing compared to the Windows team’s legendary miscommunication. The director also responded to complaints about app switching and taskbar placement options disappearing between Windows 10 and 11, because of widgets and Copilot.

The Windows boss has his work cut out for him, and seeing how much AI support he’s getting, with the keyboard’s Copilot button for the first time since 1994, we’re worried that all these components will blur some much-needed ones.

Is it that hard to take the Windows 7 menu and adapt it to the general Windows 11 interface? The user who started the Twitter thread was clear with Parakhin when he told him «I will buy a license for Start11», one of the best alternative designs that have emerged due to Microsoft’s inability to meet user needs. And if you want to do it yourself, getting Windows 7 offer absolutely freethere is nothing better than using open source development, Open Shell.