Many of us have a love-hate relationship with Windows 11's Start menu. On the one hand, it looks modern and aesthetically pleasing compared to older versions of Windows, but on the other, Microsoft insists on dedicating almost half of its space to recommendations that nobody asked for. In fact, I don't even remember clicking on anything that appeared in this section since I first installed Windows 11 in 2021. Most of the time, I'm already typing the name of an app into Search before I've even glanced at the Start menu.

However, every time I did look at the Start menu to open a pinned app, the Recommended section felt like clutter in an otherwise clean interface. It's almost as if Windows 11 is trying too hard to predict what I want to do next, even though I already know exactly what app I'm looking for before I open the Start menu. That's why I decided to turn off recommendations, and I actually like how it looks now. It's just my pinned apps and a much smaller Recommendations section that stays empty.

The Start menu tries too hard to be helpful

In reality, all it needs to do is be a launcher, not a suggestion feed

The problem with the Recommended section is that it feels like a solution to a problem that never existed in the first place. At least for me, that is. It almost gives me the impression that Windows 11 thinks I don't know what I want to open until the Start menu tells me. But the thing is, if I'm opening the Start menu, I already know what I'm looking for. I just need to type a couple of letters, and the results show up almost immediately. At that point, taking a detour through the Recommended section almost feels redundant.

All the Start menu needs to do is be a launcher and not try to overdo things. When I hit the Windows key, I don't want a bunch of suggestions that I rarely find useful taking up almost half of the interface. After all, I pinned my favorite apps there for a reason. I know exactly where they're located in the grid, and even if something I want to launch isn't there, search gets the job done already. The Recommended section isn't really saving me any time, and considering it's constantly changing based on how I use my PC, it's not something I can build muscle memory around either.

I just need my pinned apps and nothing more

Disabling recommendations was all it took to get rid of the clutter

The good news is that disabling recommendations fixes almost everything that I find frustrating about the Start menu. Besides making sure Windows doesn't suggest anything there, you can shrink the Recommended section so that only your pinned apps take up most of the space. All I had to do was go to Settings -> Personalization -> Start, toggle off almost everything in there, and set the layout to More pins to make the interface feel more personal and less like a suggestion feed.

Windows 11 still doesn't let me remove the Recommended section entirely on the public 25H2 release I'm using, but shrinking it alone made all the difference I was looking for. With just my pinned apps showing up, the Start menu finally looks cleaner and less distracting. At least now that it's centered around my choices, the Start menu no longer feels like a tug-of-war between what I want and what Windows thinks I want. I still can't wait for Microsoft to roll out 26H2 so I can finally get rid of the Recommended section completely, though.

At least Microsoft is finally listening

Giving users more control is the right move, and 26H2 finally delivers it

Now, I get that everyone doesn't use the Start menu like I do, and some of you may genuinely find the Recommended section useful to quickly jump back into recent files and apps. And that's totally fine, but at the end of the day, it's all about giving users the choice. My issue is that Microsoft has only offered limited customization options for the Start menu so far. That's why I'm happy to see Microsoft finally addressing it with the Windows 11 26H2 update.

Honestly, I can't be bothered to sign up for the Windows Insider Program just to install an experimental build that may have other issues, so I'm perfectly fine waiting for the public release. After all, it's just the Recommended section that I want to completely hide, and I'll probably leave everything else as it is, anyway. Still, it's reassuring to see Microsoft acknowledging the fact that not everyone wants the Start menu to work the same way, and that alone is a win for anyone who wants more control over how Windows looks and behaves.

A Start menu that doesn't get in my way is all I wanted

I never wanted Microsoft to reinvent the Start menu and turn it into something more than it needed to be. The whole point of bringing up the Start menu is to launch an app, not sit there and go through recommendations that Windows thinks I might find useful. I'd argue that they just make the interface feel a bit bloated when it could be much simpler. With recommendations out of the way, I'm not constantly distracted by suggestions that rarely influence what I open. I'm sure once I finally install 26H2, my Start menu will look exactly the way I've wanted it to since Windows 11 launched.