Fix problems with the Start menu

If you can’t see Start on your taskbar, the taskbar may be hidden.

Show a hidden taskbar

Press the Windows logo key + I, then select Personalization > Taskbar .

Turn on Lock the taskbar.

Turn off Automatically hide the taskbar in desktop mode or Automatically hide the taskbar in tablet mode.

If that doesn’t resolve the issue you’re experiencing, select any of the following headings to see steps you can try to get it working again.

Press Ctrl + Shift + Esc to open Task Manager. You may need to select More details at the bottom of the window to see everything.

Select the Processes tab.

Scroll down to Windows Explorer, select it, then select Restart.

The process may take a few seconds, and your taskbar and Start menu may not be visible while Windows Explorer restarts. You can close Task Manager when the process is complete.

Press the Windows logo key + I.

In Settings, choose Update & security > Windows Update , and then select Check for updates. Install any available updates and restart your computer if required.

Note: Need another way to get to Settings? Press the Windows logo key + R, then type ms-settings: (note the colon) in the Open box. Select OK to open Settings.

If you didn’t have any updates that required a restart, it’s still a good idea to restart your device to make sure any pending updates are installed.

To restart your device when you can’t access Start , press Ctrl + Alt + Delete, select Power and then select Restart .

Note: You can also manually shut down your device by pressing and holding the power button. Shutting down this way risks losing unsaved data, so first be sure to save and close everything you’re working on. If you shut down this way, you can restart your device by pressing the power button again.

While it’s likely you have the most recent drivers, if you’re still having trouble with the Start menu, you can try fixing it by manually updating your graphics or audio drivers. For more info, see Update drivers in Windows 10.

If you still can’t fix your problem with the Start menu, try creating a new local administrator account.

If you’re signed in with your Microsoft account, remove the link to that account first by doing the following (if that’s not how you’re signed in, skip to creating a new administrator account):

Press the Windows logo key + I.

In Settings, select Accounts > Your info (in some versions, it may be under Email & accounts instead).

Select Sign in with a local account instead. You’ll see this link only if you’re using a Microsoft account, and you may not see it if your device is on a network.

Type your Microsoft account password and select Next.

Choose a new account name, password, and password hint, and then select Finish and sign out.

Create the new administrator account:

Press the Windows logo key + I.

In Settings, select Accounts > Family & other people (or Other users , if you’re using Windows 10 Enterprise).

Under Other users , select Add someone else to this PC.

On Windows 10 Home and Windows 10 Professional, provide a name for the user and a password, and then select Next. On Windows 10 Enterprise, select I don’t have this person’s sign-in information, and then select Add a user without a Microsoft account.

Set a user name, password, and password hint. Then select Next > Finish.

Next, make the new account an administrator account:

Under Family & other people (or Other users , if you’re using Windows 10 Enterprise), choose the account you created, and then select Change account type.

Under Account type, select Administrator > OK.

Sign out of your account and then sign in to your new account. If everything is fixed, move your personal data and files to the new account.

To move your personal files from your old account to your new account, try opening File Explorer, expanding This PC > OSDisk (C:), and looking in the Users folder, where you should see folders for both accounts. You can then copy and paste your files from the old account folder to similar locations in the new account folder. Or if you prefer, you can upload your files from your old account to OneDrive, and then sign into the new account and download the files from OneDrive.

If the problem still isn’t fixed, try deleting the old administrator account:

Under Other users, select the old administrator account, then select Remove > Delete account and data.

After the old account is removed, restart your device and sign in with the new account again.

If you were using a Microsoft account to sign in before, associate the Microsoft account with the new administrator account.

In Settings , select Accounts > Your info (in some versions, it may be under Email & accounts instead).

Select Sign in with a Microsoft account instead and enter your account info. You’ll see this link only if you’re using a local account, and you may not see it if your device is on a network.

Note: Need another way to get to Settings? Press Windows logo key + R, then type ms-settings: (note the colon) in the Open box. Select OK to open Settings.

If none of the previous options work, try resetting your PC using Recovery options in Windows 10.

Troubleshoot Start menu errors

Start failures can be organized into these categories:

• Deployment/Install issues — Easiest to identify but difficult to recover. This failure is consistent and usually permanent. Reset, restore from backup, or rollback to recover.
• Performance issues — More common with older hardware, low-powered machines. Symptoms include: High CPU utilization, disk contention, memory resources. This makes Start very slow to respond. Behavior is intermittent depending on available resources.
• Crashes — Also easy to identify. Crashes in Shell Experience Host or related can be found in System or Application event logs. This can be a code defect or related to missing or altered permissions to files or registry keys by a program or incorrect security tightening configurations. Determining permissions issues can be time consuming but a SysInternals tool called Procmon will show Access Denied. The other option is to get a dump of the process when it crashes and depending on comfort level, review the dump in the debugger, or have support review the data.
• Hangs — in Shell Experience host or related. These are the hardest issues to identify as there are few events logged, but behavior is typically intermittent or recovers with a reboot. If a background application or service hangs, Start will not have resources to respond in time. Clean boot may help identify if the issue is related to additional software. Procmon is also useful in this scenario.
• Other issues — Customization, domain policies, deployment issues.

Basic troubleshooting

When troubleshooting basic Start issues (and for the most part, all other Windows apps), there are a few things to check if they are not working as expected. For issues where the Start menu or subcomponent isn’t working, you can do some quick tests to narrow down where the issue may reside.

Check the OS and update version

• Is the system running the latest Feature and Cumulative Monthly update?
• Did the issue start immediately after an update? Ways to check:
  • PowerShell:[System.Environment]::OSVersion.Version
  • WinVer from CMD.exe

Check if Start is installed

If Start fails immediately after a feature update, on thing to check is if the App package failed to install successfully.

If Start was working and just fails intermittently, it’s likely that Start is installed correctly, but the issue occurs downstream. The way to check for this problem is to look for output from these two PS commands:

get-AppXPackage -Name Microsoft.Windows.ShellExperienceHost

get-AppXPackage -Name Microsoft.Windows.Cortana

Failure messages will appear if they aren’t installed

If Start is not installed, then the fastest resolution is to revert to a known good configuration. This can be rolling back the update, resetting the PC to defaults (where there is a choice to save to delete user data), or restoring from backup. No method is supported to install Start Appx files. The results are often problematic and unreliable.

Check if Start is running

If either component is failing to start on boot, reviewing the event logs for errors or crashes during boot may pin point the problem. Booting with MSCONFIG and using a selective or diagnostic startup option will eliminate and/or identify possible interference from additional applications.

• get-process -name shellexperiencehost
• get-process -name searchui

If it is installed but not running, test booting into safe mode or use MSCONFIG to eliminate third-party or additional drivers and applications.

Check whether the system a clean install or upgrade

• Is this system an upgrade or clean install?
  • Run test-path «$env:windir\panther\miglog.xml»
  • If that file does not exist, the system is a clean install.
• Upgrade issues can be found by running test-path «$env:windir\panther\miglog.xml»

Check if Start is registered or activated

• Export the following Event log to CSV and do a keyword search in a text editor or spreadsheet:
  • Microsoft-Windows-TWinUI/Operational for Microsoft.Windows.ShellExperienceHost or Microsoft.Windows.Cortana
    • «Package was not found»
    • «Invalid value for registry»
    • «Element not found»
    • «Package could not be registered»

If these events are found, Start is not activated correctly. Each event will have more detail in the description and should be investigated further. Event messages can vary.

Other things to consider

When did the problem start?

• Top issues for Start menu failure are triggered
  • After an update
  • After installation of an application
  • After joining a domain or applying a domain policy
• Many of those issues are found to be
  • Permission changes on Registry keys or folders
  • Start or related component crashes or hangs
  • Customization failure

To narrow down the problem further, it’s good to note:

What is the install background?

• Was this a deployment, install from media, other
• Using customizations?
  • DISM
  • Group Policy or MDM
  • copyprofile
  • Sysprep
  • Other

• Group policy settings that restrict access or permissions to folders or registry keys can cause issues with Start performance.
• Some Group Policies intended for Windows 7 or older have been known to cause issues with Start
• Untested Start Menu customizations can cause unexpected behavior by typically not complete Start failures.

6 Ways to Fix Windows 10 “Start Menu Not Working” Issue

Since its release, several users have reported facing issues with the Windows 10 Start menu. For some, it fails to appear while others receive a «Start menu not working» error. If the newly designed Windows 10 Start menu is not properly working for your device too, here are a few ways you can try to fix the issues. These quick workarounds also help in fixing Cortana problems.

How to fix Windows 10 Start menu issues:

If you too are facing issues with the Windows 10 Start menu on your devices, try out the following fixes to see if something works out for you.

1- Restart your Windows 10 machine

It’s iOS or Android, Windows or OS X, the first thing we always recommend our users to do whenever they face some issue is to restart their devices. If Start menu is not working properly on your Windows 10 laptop or desktop, restart it! You will be amazed at how many times you will save yourself from the frustration of slamming your device to the floor. Reboot it and it will be as good as new.

2- Use Powershell

So restarting didn’t fix the Windows 10 Start menu issues for you? Well, you are not alone. We exaggerated a little bit when we promised it will be as good as new. We know sometimes you have to work harder to fix an issue, and today seems to be that day for you. Now that you have tried restarting your device, here is what more you can do to fix Windows 10 Start menu issues.

• Right-click on the Start menu icon to open the contextual menu.
• Select Command Prompt (Admin).
• Type the following commands:
  • Powershell — press Enter.
  • Get-AppXPackage -AllUsers | Foreach — Press Enter.

Wait for the command to run and it should ideally fix Windows 10 Start menu not working issue.

3- Disable or uninstall anti-virus programs

Some users have also reported that disabling or uninstalling the anti-virus program and the firewall has fixed the Windows 10 Start menu issues for them. Make sure you restart your device after uninstalling an anti-virus program.

4- Sign out of your account

Microsoft recommends that users should try signing out of their accounts to fix any Start menu related issues.

• Press Ctrl+Alt+Delete and select Sign out .
• Sign back in to your account to see if the issue has been resolved.

5- Create a new local admin account

Start menu still annoying you? Well, Microsoft has another fix for you. Try creating a new local administrator account. This will also solve any issues with Cortana.

1. Click on the Start menu icon.
2. Click on Settings to open the app.
3. Select Accounts >Family & other users >Other users.

Once that’s done, make the newly created account as an administrator account.

• Under Other users (from Step 3) , choose the account you created.
• Select Change account type .
• Under Account type , choose Administrator . Select OK to confirm.

6- Reset Windows 10 device

If nothing works for you, you can also try to reset your Windows 10 machine to fix «Start menu not working» issue.

• Go to the Settings app.
• Click on Update & Security.
• Click on Recovery.

Resetting should be your last resort after you have tried every other method. To learn more about Recovery, please visit Microsoft’s support page.

Don’t forget to share with us and our readers which of the above methods helped you fix Windows 10 Start menu issues.