regedit for download The 10 Best Registry Hacks for Windows 10. Chris Hoffman is Editor-in-Chief of How-To Geek. He's written about technology for over a decade and was a PCWorld columnist for two years. Chris has written for The Times, been interviewed as a technology expert on TV stations like Miami's NBC 6, and had his work covered by news outlets like the BBC. Since 2011, Chris has written over 2,000 articles that have been read nearly one billion times---and that's just here at How-To Geek. Read more. Windows 10’s registry is packed with useful hidden you can’t find anywhere else in Windows. From classic registry hacks that worked on Windows 7 to all-new hacks for Windows 10, here are our favorites. Switch Windows With a Single Click on the . Like Windows 7 before it, Windows 10 combines multiple windows from running applications into a single button on your taskbar. When you click the button, you see thumbnails of your open windows and you can click the one you want. But what if you could simply click an application’s taskbar button to open the last window you actively used? What if you could keep clicking the button to cycle through your open windows? You could switch between windows much more quickly. That’s what the “LastActiveClick” setting does. You can also simply press the Ctrl key and hold it down as you click a taskbar button to achieve this behavior, but LastActiveClick makes it the default behavior when you click a taskbar button—no holding down a key required. You have to enable LastActiveClick with a registry hack. This was one of our favorite registry settings on Windows 7, and it’s just as useful on Windows 10. Add Apps to the Desktop Context Menu. Applications often add shortcuts to your Windows context menus, and you can remove them if you like. If you want to add your own shortcuts, visit the registry. You can add a shortcut for any application to the Windows desktop’s context menu, giving you the ability to launch your most frequently used applications with a quick right-click on the desktop. Whether that’s Notepad or a web browser, you can hack anything you want into that menu via the registry. Show Seconds in the Taskbar Clock. Windows 10 lets you add seconds to your taskbar clock so you can see the precise time at a glance. Most won’t need this, but that precision is valuable. After all, Windows automatically synchronizes your PC’s clock with network time servers so it should be accurate down to the second. This wasn’t possible on Windows 7 without a third-party utility that modifies your taskbar clock. In fact, first experimented with this feature back in the 90s. It caused performance problems on PCs back then, so it was removed before the release of Windows 95. Now, 25 years later, you can finally get seconds on your taskbar by adding the “ShowSecondsInSystemClock ” value to your registry. Remove 3D Objects (and Other Folders) From This PC. The “This PC” view in Windows 10’s includes quite a few folders you may never use, like “3D Objects.” C’mon, Microsoft: How many Windows users really need a folder for 3D models front and center in their file managers? While Windows doesn’t offer an obvious way to remove them from the This PC view, you can do it in the registry. You can remove the 3D Objects folder from File Explorer by editing the registry. You can also remove other folders like Documents, Downloads, Music, Pictures, and Videos, if you like. Hide OneDrive from File Explorer. OneDrive is built into Windows 10, but what if you don’t want to use it? You can uninstall OneDrive, sure. But, even if you do, you’ll see a “OneDrive” option in File Explorer’s sidebar. To actually get rid of OneDrive and clear up the clutter in File Explorer, you’ll have to get rid of the OneDrive sidebar entry in the registry. Ditch the Lock Screen. Windows 10 includes a lock screen featuring beautiful images thanks to Windows . It even has widgets so you can see information from “Universal” apps like Windows 10’s and apps on your lock screen. But let’s be honest, the lock screen was originally designed for Windows 8 tablets. If you’re using a desktop PC or laptop, the lock screen is just another screen you have to press Space to bypass before typing your PIN or password. It is beautiful if you enable Windows Spotlight, though— and we haven’t seen Microsoft abuse Spotlight by inserting advertisements in a while—so it’s not all bad. To get rid of the lock screen, you can edit your registry and add the “NoLockScreen” value. Windows will go straight to the sign-in prompt whenever you boot, wake, or lock your PC. Remove Bing Search from the . When you type a search in your Start menu, Windows normally searches the web using Bing. That’s all fine and good if you want it, but what if you just want local search? Well, Microsoft doesn’t offer an easy way to disable it. Thankfully, you can still disable Bing with a registry hack. Toggle “DisableSearchBoxSuggestions” off and the Windows taskbar will just search your local files. Your searches won’t be sent to Microsoft’s servers and you won’t see Bing results when you’re just looking for local files. Get Rid of . Cortana is also tightly integrated into Windows 10’s taskbar experience. You can disable Cortana completely, but only by editing the registry. Disable the “AllowCortana” value and Microsoft’s voice assistant won’t appear as an option for the taskbar or in your Start menu. Disable Shake to Minimize. Did you know you can shake a window to minimize all your other windows? Many people only come across this feature by accident when they start moving a window by dragging its title bar and move their mouse around quickly. It’s easy to see how this feature can get in the way. To prevent accidentally triggering this feature if you never use it—and really, how many people do?—you have to enable “DisallowShaking” in the registry. Use Instead of the Photos app. Okay, let’s be honest—Windows 10’s included Photos app is a little slow. Every time you double-click an image in File Explorer and wait for Photos to load and display it, you have a split second to wonder “Weren’t image viewers faster a decade ago?”. The Photos app isn’t the only game in town, and you can still install third-party applications for a different, faster image-viewing experience. The old standby IrfanView is still around and is as fast as ever. But, if you miss the Windows Photo Viewer application from Windows 7, you can get it back. It’s still included on Windows 10, but Microsoft removed the registry settings that let you open image files in it and set it as your default image viewer. They’re not present on a new PC with Windows 10 or an old PC with a fresh install of Windows 10, but they are present if you upgraded your PC from Windows 7 or Windows 8.1. No matter, because you can use a registry hack to import the necessary registry settings on any Windows 10 PC. After adding the necessary settings to your registry, Windows Photo Viewer will appear as an option in the “Open With” menu and you can even set it as your default application for any type of images, replacing Windows 10’s Photos app. These registry hacks all still work on Windows 10’s were tested on Windows 10’s October 2020 Update, which was the most recent version available in mid-April 2021. Many of these options can also be changed in the Editor instead of RegEdit, the Registry Editor. However, you can only edit group policy if you have Windows 10 Professional, Enterprise, or Education. The registry hacks will work on all versions of Windows 10, including Windows 10 Home. How to open Registry Editor in Windows 10. Warning: Exercise extreme caution when using the Registry Editor. If you edit the registry incorrectly, serious problems might occur that could require a complete reinstall of the and result in data loss. Avoid any edits suggested by unofficial sources. For added protection, before making edits based on officially published Microsoft documentation, be sure to back up the registry. Then you can restore it if a problem occurs. For more information see How to back up and restore the registry in Windows. There are two ways to open Registry Editor in Windows 10: In the search box on the taskbar, type regedit , then select Registry Editor (Desktop app) from the results. Right-click Start , then select Run . Type regedit in the Open: box, and then select OK . Regedit editor. A lightweight and portable OS enhancement utility that allows users to enable or disable the shutdown, restart, sleep or hibernate button, set the delay time for the opened windows, waiting time before the applications are closed, and others. Regedit editor is a lightweight OS enhancement utility that allows users to perform some operations in the easiest way possible. You can disable or enable the shutdown, restart, sleep or hibernate button. It is possible to either install the program on your computer or use the portable version. If you opt for the second option, it is important to mention that it doesn’t leave any traces in the . You can copy it on any USB flash drive or other devices, and take it with you whenever you want to enhance the OS on the breeze. The user interface is really plain, and all its functions are displayed in the primary panel. There aren’t any configuration settings, and this could be good news only for the beginners who don’t want to spend a lot of time configuring dedicated parameters. Regedit editor allows users to set the delay time for the opened windows, waiting time before the applications are closed, and time parameter for previewing the desktop by typing in the values (in milliseconds) in the dedicated dialogs. Furthermore, you can make the program show the shutdown button in login mode, ask for a username when you log in, enable or disable the desktop preview, as well as turn on or off the administrator account. Since it doesn’t require much computer knowledge to work with this tool, even less experienced users can make the most out of every single built- in feature. To sum things up, although Regedit editor cannot be described as the most powerful tool on the market, it allows users to perform some OS enhancement operations quickly and with minimum effort. 12 Helpful Registry Tweaks for Windows 10. stores almost all settings to the database called “Registry” so it’s easy to manipulate or modify in a way you get things done. In this guide, we’ve placed some useful registry tweaks or call them “hacks” just to make it sound better. It’s easy to changes Windows settings by manipulating registry data. Before doing anything take a deep breath and think twice before you mess with the registry. Use your common sense to determine which registry hack would is worth to you, don’t apply all the mentioned registry tweaks, you might end up hating us and Windows 10. We would like to tell you one more thing that if you want new and better features then you can install the Windows 10 Inside preview on your computer or laptop because this is preview builds in which Microsoft keeps adding new features to . You can download from Microsoft’s website. If you want the latest preview build, you can download the ISO Files from this link. Read this before: To access registry editor press Win + r and type “Regedit” (without quotes). Also, use the Windows 10 latest version that comes with location features that help you navigate to exact registry location by copy-pasting (source) 1. Enable Windows Photo Viewer. The new Photos app took place in Windows 10 as a default photo viewer. For people loving the old Windows Photo Viewer can reverse it and use Old Photo Viewer again, which is a lightweight and fast to browse photos. 2. Disable Cortana. Microsoft’s voice assistant for Windows 10 does a lot of things and understands hundreds of commands and questions. It can now connect to an Android phone to sync notifications, alarms to the computer. Microsoft has also developed Cortana for Android, which is a Voice Assistance App, though the best voice assistant on Android mobile platforms is Google Android Assistant. There exist quite a good voice assist apps available on the Play Store ready to serve by giving voice commands. If you’re interested in the full guide, check below, please check How to Disable Cortana in Windows 10 in One-Click. 3. Stop Automatic Windows updates. Automatic updates ensure latest security patches to help prevent threats to your computer and help you keep your data safe. You can hold Automatic updates for a period of 7 days in Windows 10 insider build, but in the generic build, you might want to go ahead and mess up with registry file to disable updates. With an exception, we do not recommend disabling automatic updates completely as by doing so, the Windows Store may stop working and If you have recently installed Windows 10 then disabling automatic won’t be able to download and install drivers which can cause problems with hardware compatibility. If you know all about this you can stop the service as long as you want, the guide is linked below. 4. Bring back Command Prompt in Right-click context menu. Not a lot people actually use this feature. You’ll need this if you understand this heading. With newer Windows 10 build such as Creator update, Microsoft is replacing command prompt with PowerShell and not all the people are in favor of this. PowerShell is new and powerful, and they say but still Command prompt is the best way to deal with ADB and fastboot commands (the one used to root android or flash custom ROM). 5. Remove OneDrive from MyPc. OneDrive (Microsoft’s online storage) lets you store data online and access them on the go. The good thing is that it’s integrated into Explorer, allowing files and folder backup. Truth to be told, people always loved Google Drive more and for reason alone, remove that “OneDrive” shortcut from the File Explorer. You can uninstall OneDrive completely to remove this shortcut but here we’re just removing the shortcut. Access this location of copy-paste inside the address bar of the registry editor. Look for “System.IsPinnedToNameSpaceTree” by default its value would “0”. Double click on it. Modify it values with “0” to remove the OneDrive from the sidebar. 6. Show seconds in Taskbar. It’s fun alright! Don’t you desire Windows taskbar to show seconds as well as the time, you can do so by modifying the registry. If you also want to do this, follow the steps given below. First, navigate to the following location. Create a Dword registry with name “ShowSecondsInSystemClock” (without quote). Enter “1” as value. Click ok and exit. 7. Make Taskbar Transparent. Windows 10 taskbar is customizable, you can either set the background a solid color or have it transparent. But the default transparency level is moderate, to make it more transparent navigate to the following registry location. Create a Dword named (right-click > New) “ UseOLEDTaskbarTransparency” (without quotes). Put “1” as value under the following registry location to make the taskbar more transparent. However, you can use the following guide to make your Windows 10 taskbar a hundred percent transparent (Hint: It’s a tool) 8. Force Run Mixed Reality in Windows 10. Mixed reality portable stuck on hardware check page saying “can’t run mixed reality” you can force your computer to run mixed reality even when your computer doesn’t meet the recommended hardware compatibility criteria. 9. Add Move and Copy To shortcut in Context menu. 10. Disable unnecessary services. The above article helps in removing these services. Disabling Automatic Windows Update Removing Forced installed Apps Disable Background Intelligent Transfer Service Windows Update Limit svchost.exe process. These are some windows 10 registry hacks you can use to change several things. Watch out, don’t delete registry files, and never blindly change values, you might crash the whole operating system or cause bugs. If you know other registry hacks you would like to tell us, we’ll appreciate that. Share it with your friends (not your MAC buddies). How to Open Registry Editor. Detailed instructions on opening Registry Editor in Windows. Facebook Twitter LinkedIn. Tweet Share Email. All manual changes to the Windows Registry occur in Registry Editor, a tool included in all versions of Windows. Registry Editor lets you view, create, and modify the registry keys and registry values that make up the entire Windows Registry. There's not an obvious shortcut for the tool in most versions of Windows, so the best way to open it is by executing it from a command line. Open Registry Editor this way in any version of Windows that uses the registry, including Windows 10, Windows 8, Windows 7, Windows Vista, and Windows XP. How to Open Registry Editor. Access Registry Editor by following this procedure: In Windows 10 or Windows 8.1, right-click or tap-and-hold the Start button and then choose Run . Prior to Windows 8.1, the Run dialog box is most easily available from the Apps screen. In Windows 7 or Windows Vista, select Start . In Windows XP, select Start and then Run . One quick way you can open the Run dialog box in any of these Windows versions is to use the keyboard shortcut Win+R . In the search box or Run window, type the following, followed by Enter : Depending on your version of Windows, and how it's configured, you may see a dialog box where you'll need to confirm that you want to open Registry Editor. Registry Editor will open. If you've used Registry Editor before, it'll open up to the same location you were working in last time. If that happens, and you don't want to work with the keys or values at that location, just continue to minimize the registry keys until you've reached the top level, listing the various registry hives. You can minimize or expand registry keys by selecting the small > icon next to the key. In Windows XP, the + icon is used instead. You can now make whatever changes you need to make to the registry, which probably shouldn't be done unless you're versed in how to safely add, change, or delete registry keys and values. Make sure, whatever you do, that you only affect the narrow registry areas that you intend to. Considering the significance of the registry on your Windows-based computer, we strongly recommend that you back up the registry, either the whole thing or even just the areas you're working in, before you do anything. More Help With Registry Editor. It's important to know how to restore the Window's Registry before using Registry Editor. This lets you add a REG file backup into the registry should something go wrong during editing. Even though Registry Editor is open and ready to be used, it's not always wise to make changes yourself, manually, especially if a program or automated service can do it for you. For example, if you're using Registry Editor to clear up residual or junk registry entries, you shouldn't do it yourself unless you're very sure that you know what you're doing. Instead, use a free registry cleaner if you want to clear out common registry junk automatically. The same regedit command can be executed from Command Prompt. After opening Command Prompt, just type out the command and press Enter . Although the circumstance would have to be rare, yet another way to launch this tool is from . To do that, open Task Manager though Ctrl+Shift+Esc , go to File > Run new task , and type regedit , followed by OK . You might open it that way if you can't access the standard Run dialog box as described in Step 1 above, or if Explorer or Command Prompt won't open for some reason. If you find yourself opening this tool often, you can make a Registry Editor shortcut on your desktop. Right-click the desktop, go to New > Shortcut , type regedit , and press Next and then Finish . In some versions of Windows, you can drag the shortcut onto your taskbar for even quicker access. Opening a remote Windows Registry is a bit different of a process than the one described above for a local registry. After opening a regular Registry Editor window, there's an additional step to find the remote registry.