8 POWERTOYS YOU'LL USE EVERY DAY

MICROSOFT'S FREE UTILITIES FOR WINDOWS ADD ALL SORTS OF NEAT AND USEFUL FEATURES: NIK RAWLINSON PICKS OUT THE BEST

- NIK RAWLINSON

The Windows PowerToys date all the way back to the days of Windows 95. Those who were lucky enough to have internet access in those days could download a set of 15 little utilities that enabled them to tweak the Windows interface, customise their context menus, enhance CD-ROM features and personalise the operating system in various other ways.

Since then, the PowerToys suite has been through several iterations, with features appearing and disappearing over time; with Windows 10 it was relaunched as a set of open-source tools, distributed via GitHub and the Microsoft Store. It's also evolved from a collection of standalone utilities into a single download with a unified front end, from which you can easily activate, deactivate and manage all the various components.

You can install the suite from the Microsoft Store by searching for “Microsoft PowerToys”. Once it’s installed, launch “PowerToys (Preview)” from the Start menu to open the main PowerToys app. Don’t worry about the “Preview” part - that’s been there for many years. At this point it’s little more than a jokey reference to the fact that the PowerToys are continually being developed.

The main PowerToys dashboard gives you an overview of enabled modules, along with a quick reminder of what each one does and a handy switch for turning individual features on and off. You can browse more deeply using the navigation list on the left, which divides the available features into various categories such as “System Tools”, “Windowing & Layouts” and so forth. You can also bring up a quick-access mini-dashboard at any time by clicking the PowerToys icon in the System Tray; click the “More” button here to bring up the full dashboard.