I've never kept my frustrations with Windows to myself. Whether it's Windows 10 or Windows 11, some things never change — namely those things that Microsoft doesn't care about enough. Over the years, Microsoft has focused a significant amount of resources on making Windows a pain to use, while mining as much user data as possible.

Even though we hate many aspects of it, we continue to use it every day. As we can't easily escape it, we have formed a sort of love-hate relationship with Windows. I could go on all day about my gripes with Windows, but I'll limit myself to five things that I wish Microsoft would genuinely try to fix on the world's most-used operating system.

5 Handling Bluetooth devices

I've basically given up

I had a dream — a dream of enjoying my Sony WH-1000XM4 on my Windows PC. I wasn't asking for much, was I? Hoping to experience the same noise cancelation and sound quality that I enjoyed on my Android phone, I decided to use my headphones on my Windows 10 PC. Little did I know that Windows hates Bluetooth, and it would do everything in its power to make the experience terrible.

Bluetooth being bad on Windows should not be something that we all just accept.

The lag I had during gaming was bad, yes, but even the microphone quality was atrocious, so much so that my friends on the other end roasted me to no end. I even attempted to use them on my Windows 11 system, but there was nothing I could do to fix them. I had to finally give up on my dream, and buy a 2.4GHz gaming headset, which, interestingly, has its own set of issues.

Anyway, it's high time Microsoft fixed Bluetooth connectivity on Windows, because as it stands, wireless gaming is simply impossible if your headset doesn't have a 2.4GHz mode. However, Bluetooth being bad on Windows should not be something that we all just accept. I've read countless accounts on Reddit of others facing similar problems with other Bluetooth headsets on their Windows PCs. Someone at Microsoft should get to the bottom of this, ASAP.

4 Changing default apps

Sure, why don't I do it for every file extension?

Setting the default app for a particular type of file isn't something you do every day, but it should still be easy enough that I don't have to write about it here. Windows 10 used to handle this just fine, where you could choose a default app once, say, choosing VLC media player for a ".mp4" file, and it would automatically set it as the default for all other video file extensions (.mkv, .mov, .avi).

It's just one of the many obnoxious changes Windows 11 brought to the PC experience, prompting many users to move back from Windows 11 to Windows 10.

Windows 11, however, takes a different approach. It wants you to set the default application for every single file type separately. This lengthy process rarely makes sense, and should be changed to the old method. It's just one of the many obnoxious changes Windows 11 brought to the PC experience, prompting many users to move back from Windows 11 to Windows 10.

3 Controlling ads and bloatware

Windows 11 is basically freemium with a ton of ads

Microsoft gave Windows 10 users free upgrades to Windows 11, and while great, that meant the company had to make money elsewhere. What it turned to were thinly veiled ads and, more recently, features no one asked for. The ads situation on Windows 11 is comically bad right now, with even the login screen and the Start Menu now home to intrusive ads.

Users should not have to put up with this on software like Windows.

Windows 10 users even reported full-page ads pushing users to move to Windows 11. Microsoft has slowly but surely made ads one of the biggest highlights of Windows, and coupled with the new Copilot features, bloatware in Edge, and a mandatory Microsoft account, it has severely hurt the operating system's image. You can disable many of these things, but Microsoft keeps making it harder with every new update.

Users should not have to put up with this on software like Windows. After all, it's not free software or a poorly made app that you have fun with for a few days before discarding it. It's a mainstay of life for over a billion users worldwide, and Microsoft should re-think its strategy for the future of Windows 11, as we head into 2025 and Windows 10 reaches its end of life.

2 Pushing stable Windows updates

I've resigned myself to a world without updates

Windows Update is a weird beast to talk about. I know it's important to keep updates turned on to protect your PC, but the other stuff that I need to put up with becomes too much at some point. For instance, Windows takes arduously long to install updates, and there's no easy way to avoid mandatory driver updates. Often, a new update breaks one thing or another in the system, which I need to spend hours fixing. I'm not the only one saying this either.

This is one of the biggest areas Microsoft should be working on, making updates work for the user and not against them.

I've kept Windows Update disabled on my older Windows 10 PC for years now, come what may, braced for the worst. During this time, nothing bad has happened yet, and I'm confident nothing will. On my Windows 11 PC, however, I'm much more cautious, and put up with updates grudgingly. Updates still creep up on me at the worst time, and things end up breaking occasionally.

The new checkpoint updates are supposed to reduce the size of each update, but that still doesn't solve the worst issues of Windows Update. This is one of the biggest areas Microsoft should be working on, making updates work for the user and not against them.

1 Finding what the user is searching for

I'll do it myself

Windows Search has gone from being somewhat annoying to downright unusable. It almost always fails to bring up any results even close to what I search for. Being worse than Windows' good-for-nothing troubleshooters, it's no wonder that everyone curses Windows Search with all their might. You'd agree too if you have ever searched for a Windows setting or folder, but you were then shown Bing results on the top, with what you actually wanted nowhere in sight.

Over on the macOS side, Spotlight Search does such an amazing job finding exactly what the user needs.

It's not even a difficult problem to fix — this is what baffles me the most. Over on the macOS side, Spotlight Search does such an amazing job finding exactly what the user needs. Why, then, has Microsoft neglected Windows Search for so long? Have they decided to ignore it since no one uses it anymore? Who knows, maybe they're too busy working on 10 more places to stuff with ads or 5 more Copilot features to add to the next update, which might even bring a BSOD with it.

Will we ever stop hating Windows?

It seems like every time Microsoft launches a new version of Windows, a wave of hate comes crashing from fans of the previous version. It happened with Windows 10, and it surely happened with Windows 11. We might feel that Windows 11 deserves it more than its predecessors, but a bit of recency bias might also be at play here.

That said, Microsoft isn't doing itself any favors by bombarding users with ads, bloatware, and incessant updates. Plus, they seem callous when it comes to fixing stuff like Windows Search, Settings management, poor customization options, and more. Despite the greater market share for Windows 10, Windows 11 will soon become the only option for countless PC users as Windows 10 reaches its end next year. Microsoft should get its act together before that happens.