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  • How Can I Improve the Look of the Start Menu in Win10?

How Can I Improve the Look of the Start Menu in Win10?

October 23, 2020 / Dave Taylor / Windows 10 Help / 1 Comment

I’m bored with my Start Menu in Windows 10. I’m glad I don’t have to use a Start Page, but the big, boxy menu hasn’t changed in a really long time. When will Microsoft update its appearance?

I understand your boredom and Start Menu Fatigue (is that a thing? It should be) after all these years of exactly the same “active tiles” appearance for that menu you use every few minutes on your PC. The great news is that the timing of your question is splendid: It turns out that an upcoming Windows update actually has some changes and improvements to the utilitarian Start Menu in windows 10.

In fact, it’s known as the October 2020 Update even though it’s almost the end of October and it hasn’t officially rolled out for everyone yet. I think Microsoft might be a bit shy with this update because of the kerfuffle they got into with the previous system wide update that added some Microsoft Office apps to your PC without permission or notification. Or they’re just fine tuning the update. Either way, the good news is that if you go to Check for Updates, you’ll find it listed as an optional download. I’ll show you…

But first, the Start Menu, pre-update:

old windows 10 start menu

Notice how many of the tiles are an inappropriate color for an “automatically match wallpaper colors” theme and especially how the icons associated with each program on the left column’s “all apps” view are each stuck within a square background. Rather clumsy, if you ask me. But the update will fix those things!

Launch the Check For Updates Control Panel. Hopefully you’re up to date with the key security patches:

win10 check for updates

This can be a bit confusing if you’re not a hardcore Windows person: It’s showing that the computer is up to date and that there’s an update. Huh? That’s because feature updates (as opposed to security updates) are not automatically installed. This release – Windows 10, version 20H2 – is worth the update, however.

To do that, click on “Download and install” just under the informational paragraph about the 20H2 release.

It’ll start downloading…

downloading windows 20h2 october 2020 update

The process is download > install > restart, so after a period of time (and it can take a while!) you’ll be prompted to restart to properly install all elements of this Windows update:

windows 10 update - restart required

Close out all your other apps, documents, files, anything else you’re working on before you proceed, then come back to this window and click on “Restart now” to have all the magic happen!

microsoft windows 10 win10 restarting

Once it’s done a full restart, which might be a few seconds or a few minutes depending on your system and whether you were up-to-date with Windows 10 beforehand, you’ll find that everything basically looks the same.

Except the Start Menu. It has indeed been updated:

windows 10 20h2 update october start menu improvements design ui

Look closely and you’ll see that the active tiles are now properly picking up the color scheme (no blue tiles!) and that the clumsy square background behind the icons on the all apps listing are gone. It’s not a big update, I admit, but I do think it looks sharp and is a meaningful and attractive improvement. What do you think?

Pro Tip: I’ve been writing about Microsoft Windows since way before Windows 95. Please check out my quite extensive Windows 10 help library for hundreds of useful tutorials and how-to guides. Thanks!

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Starbucks coffee cup I do have a lot to say, and questions of my own for that matter, but first I'd like to say thank you, Dave, for all your helpful information by buying you a cup of coffee!
start menu, start menu design, start menu improvements, update start menu, windows start menu

One comment on “How Can I Improve the Look of the Start Menu in Win10?”

  1. edward p says:
    November 14, 2020 at 4:35 am

    dave, thx for the tip.

    is there some way to revert back to the hierarchical folder structure of the “all apps” section instead of alphabetical order??? rather than put them over in the tiles section, i like to keep my handy apps in a few folders and have them at the top of the list.

    any ideas w/in Win10 or a third party application/utility??

    Reply

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