It hasn't been long since I finally switched to Windows 11, but I've already got a taste of the questionable choices Microsoft has made with the OS. The relentless ads, Copilot bloat, and preloaded services are not what I'm referring to. It's the overall experience I get when using the OS every day. Many of the built-in Windows apps are nothing but wrappers for web apps. These Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) might seem like desktop applications, but they suffer from performance and usability downsides that native Windows apps don't. Microsoft has been leaning toward web apps for several years now, with internal development leaning on WebView2 and Electron despite the availability of the modern WinUI 3 framework. The apps on this list are just a few examples, but Windows 11 has a much deeper lack of truly-native applications, something Microsoft is trying to remedy. At a time when Apple has a well-stocked native app ecosystem, and you can recreate the Windows experience on Linux or even macOS, Windows needs to invest in native apps or risk losing its identity.

Weather

Under the weather

The weather app on a device that you use every day, be it your phone, laptop, or PC, is supposed to be lightweight, unobtrusive, and enjoyable to use. The Weather app on Windows 11 is none of those things. For the most part, it does what it needs to: tell me the temperature and humidity, the monthly forecast, and the past temperature trend. The problem begins when you actually use these features. The app scrolls like what you'd expect from a web app running inside a browser tab, delivering a bloated experience. I checked Task Manager to see the RAM usage, and was shocked to see the Weather app consuming over 650MB. That's just too much for a simple weather app. Plus, the app is full of ads that follow you on every screen, ruining the experience further.

If you've ever used the native Weather app on macOS, it looks and behaves the way a polished built-in app should. There are no ads, memory consumption is way lower, and the overall experience is one that you appreciate every day. Microsoft wanted to create cross-platform apps that ran the same way on PCs, laptops, Xbox, Windows Phone, HoloLens, and other devices. The Universal Windows Platform (UWP) was introduced to make this happen, but with many devices being abandoned, developers switched to creating web-based, cross-platform apps instead of native ones. The result is what we're seeing today in the form of many Windows apps running on web technologies, and it's actively harming the Windows experience.

Outlook

Look inward, Microsoft

The new Outlook app hasn't been met with the kind of enthusiasm Microsoft envisioned. Intended as a replacement for the classic Outlook desktop app, the new WebView2 version suffers from several problems, as expected. Memory usage is higher, the UI doesn't have the benefit of deep integration with the OS, and even important features like cached mailbox data for offline access are more limited. The old Outlook was perhaps one of the more important apps for many users, and seeing Microsoft reduce it to a shell of its former self must be disappointing. I use Gmail in a browser, so I removed Outlook long ago, but if your PC is also your work device and you need Outlook every day, you must have noticed that the new version feels "off."

Clipchamp

Not the people's champ

Clipchamp is Microsoft's video editing tool and the spiritual successor to Windows Movie Maker. While it's a decent tool for the job, it has some severe restrictions where it fails the user. For starters, it requires an internet connection to work properly. Without being online, you can't use all the features, limiting your workflow severely. I also felt the initial loading time to reach the home screen was quite long (as you can see in the image above), which is perhaps a direct consequence of it being yet another web app. Users who are already using third-party video-editing tools like OpenShot or Kdenlive will probably not bother with Clipchamp. It's targeted toward entry-level users anyway, but even for them, the downsides make it a questionable choice. Compared to iMovie on macOS, Clipchamp falters a lot, feeling like a half-baked attempt.

Microsoft 365

365 ways to force you to pay

Microsoft 365 comes in primarily two flavors: a free-to-use web-based version and a subscription that offers installable, offline apps. If you installed the free version of Microsoft 365 from the Microsoft Store as I did, you simply used the web app versions of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint with desktop wrappers. They're identical to their web counterparts, offer highly limited functionality, and are filled with ads, which seems to be Microsoft's formula at this point. In contrast, macOS offers all its users free access to Pages, Numbers, and Keynote, the full-fledged desktop apps for creating documents, spreadsheets, and presentations, respectively. To unlock the complete suite of features for the Office apps, though, you need to subscribe to Microsoft 365 at $99.99 a year. Most people I know simply use Google Docs for work, not bothering with Word, Excel, or PowerPoint anymore.

Microsoft has cost its users a lot, but things might finally change

Years of forcing inferior versions of its first-party apps on its users, Microsoft has ensured that its war with them rages on. Basic apps like Weather, Outlook, and Microsoft 365 feature limited functionality, forcing people to look for alternatives or pay for the full experience. Fortunately, recent developments like Windows K2 and hiring developers for native app development show that Microsoft is addressing chronic Windows issues head-on.