Windows 11 new context menu customization

Win11-context.md

If you like the design and the speed of the new context menu, but you find it useless, I have good news for you: you can customize it and make the new Win11 context more personalized.

Remove unused items

To remove unused items, you must remove items from the registry. You'll find some items in these folders, but you can also search for specific items you see in the context menu.

HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Folder\shell\ (Do NOT remove opennewwindow - it is required for file explorer to work on your windows tray.)

HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\exefile\shellex\ContextMenuHandlers\

I find the "Open in new tab" useless, since I can do the same with a middle mouse click. I never use "Open in new window", but the "Pin to Start Menu" button is also fairly useless for me. The "Pin to Quick Access" is also useless since I can just drag and drop items to the quick access.

Add new items

As a programmer, I was really missing the "Open with Visual Code" button both for files and for folders.

I found an app Custom Context Menu what is a great tool for adding new features to the windows 11 context menu. This app has an unlimited free trial, but you can also buy it for $1 to help the development. Definately worth it.

I added "Open with Visual Studio Code" for all files and folders:

{
    "title": "Open with Code",
    "exe": "C:\\Users\\_____USER_____\\AppData\\Local\\Programs\\Microsoft VS Code\\Code.exe",
    "param": "\"{path}\"",
    "icon": "C:\\Users\\_____USER_____\\AppData\\Local\\Programs\\Microsoft VS Code\\resources\\app\\resources\\win32\\code_70x70.png",
    "acceptExts": "*",
    "acceptDirectory": true,
    "acceptFile": true,
    "acceptMultipleFilesFlag": 0,
    "pathDelimiter": "",
    "paramForMultipleFiles": "",
    "index": 0
}

Don't forget to change USER to your windows user.

Don't forget to restart explorer.exe in the task manager.