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In a fresh development, however, some Insiders with preview access have criticized Microsoft’s implementation and its limitations. Patched on September 1st, 2026: Microsoft is finally streamlining the Windows 11 right-click menu with the upcoming 26H2 patch in October.
In a fresh development, those entries will be shown under the “Show more options” submenu, which must be activated manually in the Settings. In other words, accessing these entries will become more cumbersome than it is now pre-patch. (Currently, these custom entries appear as top-level actions in the context menu.). The main complaint comes from users who have added their own context menu entries via the Windows Registry.
According to the latest update, it’s unclear whether Microsoft will take this criticism aboard and make changes prior to 26H2’s drop. In short, if you want to benefit from the streamlined context menu design, you essentially have to give up on custom entries and the “Show more options” submenu.
According to the latest update, but over time, the Windows 11 Context Menu has grown cluttered and unusable. Original story from November 6th, 2025: The Context Menu in Windows 11 (also known as the right-click menu) is meant to be a convenient shortcut for common actions, making it much easier to do various things via just a few simple clicks.
As part of the ongoing story, in a WinUI Audience Call video stream that went live yesterday, one section covered improvements to the Context Menu that are currently being explored. The revamp is being called Split Context Menu. Microsoft isn’t just aware of this, but also committed to rectifying it.
In a fresh development, furthermore, the Windows 11 Context Menu is—despite its name—not truly contextual, meaning it includes way too many items even in contexts where some of those items don’t make sense. In Microsoft’s own words, the current MenuFlyoutItem control doesn’t allow for split actions, which is why the menu has grown so cluttered over the years.
According to the latest update, a fresh control called SplitMenuFlyoutItem, which will support “context-aware groupings and customizations” that allow the Context Menu to adapt to user selections. WinUI developers will be able to define primary and secondary actions, paving the way for submenus that improve workflows and reduce main menu clutter. The solution?
The report highlights that the API will first need to be developed, then presumably it will need to be tested by Windows Insiders. As of now, it’s unclear when the fresh Split Context Menu will be made available to the public.
According to the latest update, further reading: Why you should become a Windows Insider.
As part of the ongoing story, this article originally appeared on our sister publication PC för Alla and was translated and localized from Swedish.
The report highlights that he has previously worked with Macworld, but today mainly writes for our sister sites PC för Alla and M3. Mikael has a firm grasp on which gadgets are dropped, and what is happening with the streaming services and the most recent AI tools. Mikael writes news across all our consumer tech categories.
As part of the ongoing story, he has been writing on almost all IT topics for around 25 years, covering everything from news to reviews and buying guides. Hans-Christian Dirscherl began his IT life with Autoexec.bat and config.sys, Turbo-Pascal and C, Sinix and Wordperfect.