You can move Taskbar in Windows 11 and change its location. While Windows 11 doesn't yet include such a setting, this can be done with a Registry tweak.
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Windows 11 is the newest operating system from Microsoft. It brought a drastically changed, completely new user interface. It includes a new Start menu which appears in the screen center. The change has also affected the taskbar, which is also centered.
Perhaps the worst change made to taskbar is its location. Windows 11 doesn't allow you to move it to the side or top, it always appears at the bottom of the screen.
This post will show you how to move the taskbar and change its location in Windows 11. You can either place it at the top or bottom.
Move Taskbar in Windows 11 and Change its Location
- Press Win + R and type
regeditin the Run dialog to open the Registry editor. - Navigate to the key
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\StuckRects3. - Right-click the StuckRects3 key and select Export... from the menu. Save the REG file to the Desktop folder.
- Double-click the Settings value.
- In the 0008 row, place your cursor to the fifth column, where you see the 03 value.
- Press DEL to remove
03, and type01.
- Click on OK in the Edit binary value dialog.
- Restart the Explorer shell using the Task Manager method.
You're done! The taskbar now appears at the top.
How to undo the change and move the taskbar back to bottom
To undo the change, double-click the exported REG file which you have created in the step #3. When prompted, click on the UAC confirmation prompt.
Alternatively, you can modify the above mentioned Settings binary value, and change its fifth column from 01 to 03, i.e. to its default value. Don't forget to restart the Explorer shell.
Note that restarting the Explorer shell is a mandatory step. You cannot simply sign out and sign in back to your user session. That's won't work!
To properly change the Windows 11 taskbar location, please restart Explorer as follows.
- Press Ctrl + Shift + Esc to open the Task Manager.
- In Task Manager, click on More details to make it show tabs with apps and services.
- On the Processes tab, find Windows Explorer and click it.
- Click on the Restart button.
You are done.
I will update this post once I figure out how to move the taskbar to the screen side. Currently, it is unknown.
That's it.
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Good luck figuring out how to move the taskbar to the sides of the display, I have bookmarked this page and look forward to it! Thanks for your hard work!
Set it to 02 or 04. but the icons on the taskbar completely break.
That’s really horrible.
That’s why I didn’t include these value in the post.
You set it to 00 to move it to the left edge of your screen. (Count from left clockwise 0, 1, 2, 3 for left, top, right, bottom.) The sad part is that it becomes unusable. None of what should go into the taskbar shows, and the tray is all messed up. It appears the reason the vertical positions are not exposed in the UI is that they are indeed not fully implemented yet.
Is there also a possibility to move the taskbar to a different display without changing the main display? Also maybe a possibility to disable button grouping?
According to Microsoft, this is not implemented yet.
Works great! Moving to the sides is changing the values to either 0 (left) or 2 (right)
It however doesn”t work as it should and keeps crashing the explorer.
Works great, only problem is the Start Menu open on the left hand side rather than under the Menu icons – any idea how to “fix” that?
I hope Microsoft will fix this.
It doesn’t work for me, build 22000.51
Thank you! I tried other value such as 00 to 04. Looks like all the icons would not stay stable on the left or right. They are crashing the explorer.
it is absurd that microsoft does not allow it, personally I have always used the bar on the left because it makes more sense with a widescreen
Thank you, it’s working for me
What if StuckRects3 key is missing?
right click the taskbar and select the only item, taskbar settings.
change some settings, e.g. move icons from center to left.
then change everything back.
this will create the key
Thanks for this. Do you know how to move the taskbar up on a second monitor as well?
Hi.
Currently, I have no idea.
there is a MMStuckRects3 located up a bit from StuckRects3 registry, this guy says resets taskbar on multiple monitors httрs://www.tесhnоhоliсplus.соm/windоws/windоws-11-tаskbаr-sеttings/
however I tried it but did not work on other monitors yet anyway.
Don’t use it. If you open up 2 instances of the same app, for eg 2 windows of file explorer or browser, you will not be able to maximize it without “alt-tabbing”. It works with the old taskbar though but the old taskbar causes other problems.
Hello! When more than 1 window is open, a specific cannot be selected. Can it be fixed?
*This happens when the bar is on top.
alt+tab… but since last update i’m unable to see it too.
Does anyone have any idea how do I move my taskbar to a different monitor?
How do we move the taskbar to a different monitor?
Placing the taskbar on top, the preview thumbnail does not appear when hovering the mouse pointer over the application icons and if there are 2 or more instances of the same application open, it does not restore the windows from the bar if they are minimized.
Does this happen to someone else?
it happens to everyone. there is no solution (yet)
Thanks, Sergey.
It is not ideal, but I have seen that deactivating the taskbar thumbnails with “winaero tweaker” (Desktop and taskbar / Taskbar Thumbnails / Disable Thumbnails Completely ) a list appears when clicking on the icon of a task that has two or more open instances, and you can select which instance to restore.
When move taskbar win11 on top,start menu not center :(
what retard wants this sh~~ on top? I NEED IT ON ANOTHER MONITOR WHY IS THAT NOT WORKING
Because it is “under construction”. Microsoft has released the new UI too early.
if you have a grid of monitors set up (one on top of the other) and the taskbar on the top of each monitor set to autohide, it ends up covering the bottom of the monitor above it when it hides. It just repositions itself above that monitor’s viewport i guess, which can end up moving onto the monitor above it. Not sure how to best describe that.
Since Windows 11 Insider Preview 22533.1001 (rs_prerelease) it is no longer possible to move the Taskbar at all. The registry value gets instantly rewritten to 03 or wont be changed at all. It also reverts the change when set to 01 before the update. Till today there is also no native functionality to move the Taskbar at all.
This is the most disappoiting change in Windows 11 for me.
Hey, tried the setting from the article – but no go (22000.469). WinearoTweaker changes more settings there – 5 instead of one mentioned in article. Any updates to article planned for this?
And what about 22533.1001 – even WinaeroTweaket won’t work (with 5 changes)? :(
Taskbar on top with new huge monitors is a must have, how can’t they understand it?? Rhetoric question…
Hello,
Thanks to provide a solution to switch the taskbar to the top. Meanwhile, the icons still open on top of the taskbar so I cannot switch from app to app when several windows are open. Any solution ? I do not intend to use the classic taskbar as the start menu process is too heavy to implement!
Cecile
It looks like we have no workaround for this issue.
Sadly, this does not work anymore. The registry values just go back to the default 03.