6 Start Menu Replacements for Windows 8

Want a Start menu on your Windows 8 desktop? While Microsoft no longer includes the Start button, opting instead for a click in a hidden corner and a new Start screen, there are quite a few Start menu replacements you can choose from.
You can try living without the Start button and customizing your Start screen – it’s very possible to get by without the Start button and some people seem to prefer the new interface – but you have a choice.
Many of these tools also allow you to boot directly to the desktop and hide the charms and app switcher that appear when you move your cursor to the corners of the screen, giving you a more traditional desktop experience.

Classic Shell

Classic Shell is a free, open-source Start menu replacement. It includes skins that can mimic the Windows 7/Vista, Windows XP, or Windows 2000/98 start menus and is extremely configurable. If you’re using Ninite to set up your new computer with the software you like, you’ll find that Ninite can now install Classic Start.
For a more in-depth look at Classic Shell, read How To Log Into The Desktop, Add a Start Menu, and Disable Hot Corners in Windows 8.

Start8

Stardock’s Start8 offers a Windows 8-style Start menu in addition to a Windows 7-style Start menu. Unlike Classic Shell, Start8 isn’t free – while there’s a 30-day free trial, you’ll have to pay $5 if you want to use Start8 long-term.
Start8′s Windows 7-style Start menu is a more accurate reproduction of Windows 7’s Start menu than Classic Shell’s.

Start8′s Windows 8-style Start menu isn’t too shabby, either – it feels similar to the new Start screen, but you can use it without going full-screen.

IOBit StartMenu8

Try IObit StartMenu8 if you’re disappointed by Classic Shell and don’t want to shell out $5 for Start8. IObit StartMenu8 is completely free and works more similarly to the Windows 7 Start menu than Classic Shell does.
Note: some readers have written in complaining about ads included in IOBit products, so we have removed the link.

Right-click the StartMenu8 icon and you’ll find many of the more useful options for using your computer as a traditional desktop, including the ability to skip the Start screen at login, hide the charms sidebar, and disable the other hot corners.

Make Your Own Start Menu

Using the Windows taskbar’s support for “toolbars” that can display the contents of a folder, you can create your own Start menu replacement without installing any third-party software.
For instructions, check out How to Get the Classic Start Menu Back in Windows 8.

Pokki

Pokki is primarily an “app store” for Windows, but it also offers a Start menu for Windows 8. Unlike the other Start menus here, Pokki doesn’t try to copy Microsoft’s Start menus exactly. It has a different design, which you may or may not prefer. There are separate categories for your applications and settings and you can also pin your most-used programs to the Favorites section.

ViStart

There’s also ViStart, which was one of the most talked-about Start menus when the first preview releases of Windows 8 were released with no traditional Start menu. Unfortunately, ViStart’s installer is now full of useless toolbars and other junkware – we can’t recommend ViStart when the other Start menus here work so well. 

 

The third-party Start menu ecosystem is flourishing. Samsung and Toshiba are even writing their own Start menus – Samsung Quick Starter and Toshiba Desktop Assist – and including them with their Windows 8 computers. It’s very possible other PC manufacturers will follow

How to Get the Classic Start Menu Back in Windows 8

Both the Start button and classic Start menu are gone in Windows 8. If you don’t like the full-screen, Metro-style “Start screen,” there are a few ways to get a classic-style Start menu back.
In the Developer Preview of Windows 8, you could remove Metro by deleting the shsxs.dll file, but you can’t do this in the Consumer Preview. Metro is now baked into Explorer.exe itself.

Create a Start Menu Toolbar

It’s not a well-known feature, but Windows can create toolbars that show the contents of a folder on its taskbar. This means that you can create a pseudo-Start menu without installing any other software on Windows 8. Just create a new toolbar that points at the Start menu’s Programs folder.
From the desktop, right-click the taskbar, point to Toolbars and select “New toolbar.”

Type or copy and paste the following path into the Choose a folder window:

%ProgramData%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs

Click the “Select Folder” button and you’ll get a Programs menu on your taskbar.

Right-click the taskbar and uncheck “Lock the taskbar” if you want to move the new Programs menu around.

Drag and drop the grip at the left side of the toolbar to place it somewhere else on the taskbar, like at its left side — the Start menu’s traditional location.

Right-click the “Programs” text if you want to change or hide its name. After you’re finished, right-click the taskbar again and select “Lock the taskbar.”
There’s one catch with this method — it won’t actually show all your programs. The Start menu actually grabs shortcuts from two different places. In addition to the system-wide ProgramData location, there’s a per-user Programs folder at the following location:

%AppData%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs

As you can see from the screenshots, the Windows Defender shortcut — and other shortcuts — don’t appear in our toolbar menu.
You could create a second toolbar to list programs from this folder, or perhaps move shortcuts from the %AppData% location to the %ProgramData% location.
Another option is creating a custom folder full of program shortcuts and using a toolbar that points at that folder instead.

Install ViStart, a Third-Party Start Button

ViStart is making the rounds as a third-party Start button replacement. It was originally designed to add a Windows 7-style Start button to Windows XP, so it’s basically a re-implementation of the Windows 7 Start button. And it works on Windows 8.
ViStart wants to install other software when you install it – click the Decline button.

After it’s installed, you’ll see the Windows 7-style Start orb back at the left side of your taskbar.

Click it and you’ll see the familiar Start menu. Almost everything works as you’d expect, although I couldn’t find a way to pin apps to the Start menu. It still shows your most frequently used apps.

Right-click the ViStart system tray icon and select Options if you want to configure it.

You’ll find options for changing the default Web browser, email client and other program settings.

One bonus is that ViStart takes over your Windows key. Pressing the Windows key opens the ViStart Start menu, not the Metro-style Start screen.
You can still open the Start screen by moving your cursor to the very bottom-left corner of the screen, or from the Charms menu that appears when you hover your cursor over either the upper or lower-right corners of your screen.

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If you prefer a different Start menu replacement, leave a comment and let us know about it.

How To Log Into The Desktop, Add a Start Menu, and Disable Hot Corners in Windows 8

If you don’t have a touchscreen computer and spend all your time on the desktop, Windows 8’s new interface can seem intrusive. Microsoft won’t allow you to disable the new interface, but Classic Shell provides the options Microsoft didn’t.

In addition to providing a Start button, Classic Shell can take you straight to the desktop when you log in and disable the hot corners that activate the charms and metro app switcher.

There are other programs that do this, but Classic Shell is free and open-source. Many of the alternatives, such as Start8 and RetroUI, are commercial apps that cost money. 

 

Installation

You can download Classic Shell from Sourceforge. It isn’t just a Start menu – it also adds some other features that have been removed from Windows 8. The Classic Shell installer also includes Classic Explorer, which adds a toolbar to Windows Explorer, and Classic IE9, which adds a few features to Internet Explorer 9.

To avoid cluttering File Explorer and Internet Explorer, you can disable both of these options during the installation process.

Start Button

After installing Classic Shell, you’ll see a Start button in the familiar place. Pressing the Windows key will activate the Classic Shell start menu, just as you’d expect.

Classic Shell uses the Windows Classic layout – which imitates Windows 2000 and Windows 98 – by default. There are also Windows 7 and Windows XP styles you can choose.

Whichever interface you’re using, the search box will search through your installed programs, so you can quickly launch programs by searching, just as you could on Windows 7 and Windows Vista. Unlike the new Start screen, searching in Classic Shell will display applications and control panel applets in the same list – you don’t have to select another area to search if you’re looking for Control Panel settings.

Disabling the Modern Interface

Classic Shell will automatically log you directly into your desktop and disable the bottom left Start screen hot corner when you install it. This still leaves the app switcher (which only works for Modern apps) in the top left corner and the charms bar at the right side of your screen. if you’d rather not see these while using our desktop, you can disable them from Classic Shell’s settings.

To tweak these settings, select the All Settings option at the bottom of the Classic Start Menu settings window and click the Windows 8 Settings tab. From here, you can tell Classic Shell to disable all active corners.

You can still access the charms bar and app switcher using Windows 8’s hotkeys, if you like. Press Winkey+C to access the charms and WinKey+Tab to access the switcher.

Note that the “Skip Metro screen” option isn’t perfect – when you log in, there’s a slight delay while the Start screen Is still visible before Classic Shell opens your desktop. Microsoft went out of their way to make logging directly into the desktop hard.

However, if you lock your computer instead of logging out, you’ll see the desktop when you log in — so you’ll only have to see the Start screen for a second if you shut down or log out of your computer.
Customization

Classic Shell is a tweaker’s dream. It’s filled with options for controlling everything about the Start menu and Start button, including support for custom Start button images and skins.

For example, you can select a Metro-style skin on the Skins tab and a Metro-style Start button image on the Start Button tab to make Classic Shell feel more at home in Windows 8. The other tabs are packed with options for controlling every inch of your Start menu.

To open the settings screen in the future, you can right-click the Classic Shell Start button and select the settings option.