One of the biggest cosmetic changes in Windows 11 is the shifting of the Start button towards the centre of the screen. We’ll show you how to put the Windows 11 Start button back on the left.
Move the Windows 11 Start button
The Start button is part of the Windows Taskbar. Technically, this article concerns aligning the Taskbar but we’ll continue to refer to it as moving the Start button.
As with all things Windows, there are a few ways to resolve this. The easiest is to move the mouse to the bottom of the screen, then right-click the Taskbar to pop-up the Taskbar settings option. Clicking this brings up the Taskbar personalisation settings.
Scroll to the bottom of the page and select Taskbar behaviours.
It won’t take you too long to work out what to do here. Next to Taskbar alignment, click the drop-down list to change the position from Center to Left.
As soon as you make the switch, the Start button (and everything else) will scuttle back towards its natural habitat, exactly as Saint William of Redmond intended. It really is that simple to move the Start menu back to the left. If, for some reason, you believe that the centrally aligned Start menu is preferred, then have a strong word with yourself and take a cold shower before deciding if you really wish to flip the option back to Centre.
Whilst you’re here…
Whilst you’re poking around, the option above, Taskbar corner overflow controls the right-hand side of the Taskbar if too many icons are appearing.
Not every Windows app has a Taskbar icon. This menu controls which are a permanent fixture, and which are held in the overflow (accessible via the ^ icon).
In this example, I’ve set the Taskbar corner overflow options for Windows Explorer and OneDrive to On (so they’re permanent) and everything else to Off (available in the overflow). If you’re using Windows on a small screen, this is a handy feature to de-clutter the UI.
How do I remove recommended items from the Windows 11 start menu?
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