Windows 10 might soon let you turn off Aero Shake

By Sean Endicott
published

You might soon be able to enable or disable an infamous feature that dates back to Windows 7

Surface Laptop 3 15
Surface Laptop 3 15 (Image credit: Windows Central)

What you need to know

  • Windows 10 might soon have an option to turn off Aero Shake.
  • Aero Shake is the feature that lets you wiggle a window to minimize all other windows.
  • A person known for tinkering with Windows managed to get a toggle to work for the feature.

Windows 10 has a feature that's probably not used by many people called Aero Shake. The feature allows you to minimize all windows except for one by clicking on the title bar of a window and wiggling it back and forth on your desktop.

Aero Shake first arrived in Windows 7, and it's one of those features that many people could probably live their entire life without ever using on purpose. It has its uses, but some people might not like it activating accidentally. If you click a window to move it around but move around too quickly, you might accidentally minimize all of your other windows. You can undo this by clicking and wiggling the window again, but it still might be inconvenient.

According to Twitter user "Albacore," Windows 10 might soon have a toggle to run Aero Shake on or off.

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Albacore is a known tinkerer of Windows that you may recognize from their work on getting Windows 10X to run on unsupported devices.

In a recent Tweet, Albacore discusses the option to turn Aero Shake on or off. The actual toggle doesn't appear in the screenshot but is described by Albacore.

There are some other ways to disable Aero Shake, including some popular hacks. You can also disable it by turning off snapping, but that, of course, also turns off snapping.

Options for settings are always good, so it will be nice if this arrives on Windows 10 in the future.

Sean Endicott
Sean Endicott
News Writer and apps editor

Sean Endicott brings nearly a decade of experience covering Microsoft and Windows news to Windows Central. He joined our team in 2017 as an app reviewer and now heads up our day-to-day news coverage. If you have a news tip or an app to review, hit him up at sean.endicott@futurenet.com (opens in new tab).

14 Comments
  • I never even knew this feature existed
  • Glad they are giving us the option to turn it back on.
  • Agreed! When I read it was going away I was super disappointed. Glad to read this today.
  • what version are you on that doesn't have it enabled? I'm pretty sure it's been enabled ever since 7
  • Never knew it was there. Tried it. Like it.
  • It always activates at the wrong time for me in my experience. The best option is a simple on-off toggle as they intend to implement.
  • You mean the times when you shake a window for no apparent reason? Unless you have a physical disability that prevents you controlling the mouse normally, I don't really see how this feature could actually be a genuine problem. That said, my imagination is not the limiting factor on reality.
  • Sometimes it's too sensitive. There are times when I'm just moving some windows around and if you accidently move it in a back and forth motion, not every necessarily quickly, it'll activate that function. It's not super common that I activate it without intending to but it has definitely happened more than once.
  • it's probably not an issue if you're not doing much desktop multitasking. It's also really not clear exactly what constitutes "shaking," and unlike all other window management features, there's no indication it's about to occur... and no way to abort doing it. Never in my life have I seen someone use the feature intentionally. If you're not profoundly irritated by aero shake, consider yourself lucky.
  • I had completely forgotten about this feature. I imagine that it would have come in handy at times in the past and will in the future.
  • Never heard of this before. Gonna try it out but it seems a bit gimmicky compared to eg WinKey+D to show the desktop (I realize it is not entirely the same effect).
  • didn't know this was a thing. don't know what the point is for me since i use everything full screen. never understood people that use stuff in small windows. why do that when it is just as easy to change between them fast. i just can't stand having stuff in windows
  • You need a bigger monitor.
  • Yup big and high resolution monitors. Great for productivity