Desktop setting windows 10: Change desktop background and colors

20 марта, 2023

View display settings in Windows

Windows 11 Windows 10 More…Less


Most of the advanced display settings from previous versions of Windows are now available on the Display settings page.

  • Select Start > Settings > System > Display.

  • If you want to change the size of your text and apps, choose an option from the drop-down menu next to Scale. Learn how to change just your text size in Make Windows easier to see.

  • To change your screen resolution, use the drop-down menu next to Display resolution.  Note: You should use the Recommended resolution. If you change the resolution, content might appear blurry or pixelated.

  • To adjust your color calibration, search «calibrate display color» in the Settings search box and follow the directions.

  • If you don’t see a setting you’re looking for, try searching for it in the search box on the taskbar.


Open Display settings

Most of the advanced display settings from previous versions of Windows are now available on the Display settings page.

  • Select Start > Settings > System > Display.

  • If you want to change the size of your text and apps, choose an option from the drop-down menu under Scale and layout. Learn how to change just your text size in Make Windows easier to see.

  • To change your screen resolution, use the drop-down menu under Display resolution. Note: You should use the Recommended resolution. If you change the resolution, content might appear blurry or pixelated.

  • To adjust your color calibration, search «calibrate display color» in the Settings search box and follow the directions.

  • If you don’t see a setting you’re looking for, try searching for it in the search box on the taskbar.


Open Display settings


How to Change the Look and Feel of Your Windows 10 Desktop

While Windows 10 has a slick look out of the box, you may still wonder how to make your Windows 10 system look better. We’re here to explain the wealth of customization options that will make your desktop environment more personal.

Walk through these methods to change the look and feel of Windows, and your computer will be a livelier place once you’re all done.

1. Set a New Desktop Wallpaper and Lock Screen Background

One of the easiest ways to give your desktop a new look is to pick a desktop wallpaper that matches your interests. To do this, open the Settings app (using the keyboard shortcut Win + I is a convenient way) and enter the Personalization section.

Here, on the Background tab, you’ll find several options related to your desktop wallpaper. In the dropdown box under Background, select Picture if you want to use a single image. Hit the Browse button below this to choose an image from your PC. Have a look at some great sites for finding new wallpapers if you need ideas.

If you want to go beyond a static image, choose the Slideshow option for your desktop wallpaper. Pick a folder full of images on your computer, and Windows will change them at an interval you set.

At the bottom, you can choose how your images fit onto the screen if they’re not the right size. If you’re not sure, Fill usually provides the best results. We’ve covered tips for beautifying your desktop wallpaper if you need more advice.

While you’re here, head over to the Lock screen tab to pick an image for that display too. Just like your desktop, you can choose a single image or a slideshow. The Windows spotlight option will load new images so you don’t have to find them yourself.

2. Paint Windows With Your Favorite Color

While still in the Personalization window of Settings, hop over to the Colors tab for another easy Windows customization option. Select your favorite color from the grid to apply that color all over Windows.

If you don’t like any of the standard colors, open Custom color for more granular control. For a more cohesive look, you can check Automatically pick an accent color from my background and Windows will set the color based on your wallpaper.

Once you’ve picked one out, check both of the boxes under Show accent color on the following surfaces to apply it on app title bars, as well as Windows elements like the taskbar and Start menu.

Also on this menu, you can disable Windows 10’s transparency effects and choose between light and dark modes. If you hate getting blinded by white lights, dark mode in Windows is an easy and drastic way to make the OS look better.

3. Set an Account Picture

The generic gray silhouette that represents your Windows 10 user account out of the box is boring. You can personalize your account with a custom photo, which is especially useful on multi-user systems.

To do this, visit Settings > Accounts > Your info. Under Create your picture, you can select Camera to take a new photo with your webcam, or Browse for one to upload a picture from your PC.

Once set, you’ll see this icon in a few places around the Windows interface. This makes your computer aesthetic feel just a bit more personal, as default profile icons are no fun.

Chances are that you use the Start menu often to launch programs and search your files. To streamline it, you should customize your Windows 10 Start menu to remove junk tiles and feature the apps you actually care about.

To quickly remove a tile from the Start Menu, right-click it and choose Unpin from Start. You can also remove all tiles in a group by right-clicking the group name and selecting Unpin group from Start.

Next, you can make the Start menu more useful by dragging apps you frequently use from the list to the tile area on the right. These act as shortcuts, and apps with Live Tiles can even update with new information in real-time (similar to widgets on Android and iOS).

While you’re in the Start menu, you should also take the time to remove Windows 10 bloatware. This will keep an important element of your desktop looking great.

5. Tidy and Organize Your Desktop

Having a load of desktop icons can get in the way of seeing the wallpaper you picked out. Many people use their desktop as a general dumping ground for files they don’t know what to do with yet, leading to it getting messy fast.

The few quick steps below can go a long way to making your desktop a saner place. If you’ve got a particularly messy situation, you may also need our guide to cleaning your desktop once and for all.

Hide System Icons on the Desktop

First, you might want to hide default Windows icons like This PC so they don’t waste space on your desktop. To do this, visit Settings > Personalization > Themes and click the Desktop icon settings link on the right side of the window. If you don’t see this, extend the Settings window horizontally until it appears.

This will bring up a small new window, where you can uncheck any Windows icons you don’t want to display. Hiding unnecessary icons helps your cool wallpaper shine through.

Organize Desktop Icons

Next, you can take advantage of a few tools to organize your desktop icons by right-clicking an empty space on your desktop and selecting View. This lets you change the icon size, auto-arrange them, and snap all icons to the grid.

If you’d like, you can even uncheck Show desktop icons to hide them all. Note that this doesn’t delete your files; it simply removes the icons. You can still browse the files on your desktop using File Explorer.

Once you’ve got the visual layout how you like it, use the Sort by menu option to automatically list your desktop icons by various criteria.

If you want something more powerful, you can use a third-party tool like Fences or a desktop management alternative to wrangle your desktop icons.

6. Customize Windows Sounds

So far, we’ve looked at how to make Windows look better visually. But you can customize how Windows sounds, too. It only takes a bit of work to override the generic default noises.

To adjust Windows sounds, go to Settings > System > Sound and click the Sound Control Panel link on the right side. In the resulting window, switch to the Sounds tab.

Here you’ll see a list of various events that Windows plays sounds for. Each one that’s currently enabled displays a speaker icon next to it. Highlight the one you’d like to preview, then click the Test button to hear it. To replace a sound, highlight it and pick a new sound from the dropdown menu.

If you can’t find a sound you like, click the Browse button to select a file from your computer. Note that all Windows sounds must be in WAV format to work properly.

For more on this, including where to find new packs of sounds, see our overview of customizing Windows 10 sounds.

7. Make Windows 10 Look Really Cool With Rainmeter

No discussion of how to make Windows 10 look beautiful is complete without mention of Rainmeter. It’s the ultimate desktop customization tool, and perfect for more advanced users who aren’t satisfied with what we’ve covered above.

Because of everything it can do, Rainmeter is often overwhelming for new users. A full discussion of how to use it is beyond the scope of this guide, so have a look at how to create custom desktop icons with Rainmeter and some of the best minimalist Rainmeter skins to get started.

So Many Ways to Make Windows Look Better

With these customizations, you’ve done quite a bit of work to make Windows 10 unique to you. Armed with custom wallpapers, sounds, and colors—plus an organized desktop and Start menu—your Windows 10 installation won’t look quite like anyone else’s.

Of course, you can also go further with more third-party tools for deep Windows customization.

How to effectively customize the interface and appearance of the Desktop in a computer on Windows 10

Undoubtedly, today Windows 10 is a kind of locomotive for Microsoft. They believe in it, they improve it, make it more convenient to use, I would say even more, more simplified and understandable. I want to share with you my skills and knowledge in terms of setting up the device itself on Windows 10 so that its use brings joy and pleasure. Keep in mind that Windows 10 is very similar to its predecessors. Therefore, here you will meet many things that you know. I have already written about the differences in my articles.

After you have upgraded your device to Windows 10, the desktop will open in front of you.

Some users just don’t know what to do now. Just calm down and consider everything. Everything in Windows 10 is made so that you can work on it from the first second. Applications from Microsoft, which I also wrote about, will allow you to work on your computer.

I’ll tell you how to more effectively configure your device.

Desktop personalization

It is unlikely that among Windows users there are many who do not change the design of the operating system interface in any way — at least everyone probably changes the wallpaper on the desktop. Everyone wants to see the interface sharpened just for themselves. Windows 10 makes it easy to customize the look and feel of your desktop. To access personalization settings, right-click anywhere on the desktop and select Personalization from the context menu. The personalization settings screen will open. Can also be opened by following path Options — Personalization .

By clicking on the option Background you will be able to change the desktop background. You can set the standard Windows 10 background or choose your own folder with images. I always choose my photos, but sometimes I dilute them with extraneous images. If you have a large selection of desktop wallpapers, it is convenient to use them as a background in slideshow mode. To do this, you just need to select the «Slideshow» item in the «Background» drop-down list, and then specify the path to the image folder using the «Browse» button. For images in a slide show, you can also choose a suitable position, and of course set the frequency of their change.

In the section Colors you can easily change the background color. The Windows 10 interface is multi-colored, the background colors are rich, warm and with a varied palette. By changing the background color, you can automatically change the color of the Start menu and Action Center.

Section Lock Screen allows you to set a background screensaver that will greet you when you turn on your device. Here you can also set your own image. To do this, just click on Browse and any of your photos will be displayed on the Lock Screen.

Recently, there have been reports on the Internet that Microsoft has started to place various kinds of ads on the Lock Screen. Disabling it is easy if you turn off the setting « Display fun facts, jokes, tips and other information on the lock screen». Then advertising will no longer bother you. Below you can select the list of applications that will be displayed on the Lock Screen. For some, this is very convenient after using smartphones.

Section Themes will allow you to install, as you might guess, various themes on your desktop. By clicking on Theme Options, you get to Personalization, which you saw in Windows 7 / 8.1. Here you can use Windows 10 themes, and you can also add your own. You will also find related settings here.

How to find a cool theme for your desktop and lock screen?

If you want to find cool themes and backgrounds for your Desktop and Lock Screen, it’s very easy to do it by clicking on Other topics on the Internet. You will find yourself in Gallery personalization , where you will find a theme or background image for every taste and theme. They can be easily downloaded and installed on your device without restrictions. For those who want to download without digging into the settings, here is a direct link: http://windows. microsoft.com/en-us/windows/themes?ocid=w8_client_themes. Let your device please you with a beautiful theme.

How to customize the start menu?

Windows 10 has reintroduced the Start menu, this time a mixture of Windows 7 Start and Windows 8 Start. However, the lack of such a menu in the previous version of the OS was probably its most often mentioned shortcoming. among users.

The new Start menu is easy to understand. By default, the Start menu is a panel divided into two parts, where a list of frequently used applications is displayed on the left (by right-clicking on which you can prevent them from showing in this list).

There is also an item for accessing the All Applications list, which displays all your programs arranged alphabetically, items for opening File Explorer (or, if you click on the arrow next to this item, for quick access to frequently used folders), options, shutdown or restart your computer.

In the upper right corner you will see the username, by clicking on which you can set up an account, log out or lock the computer.

The right side contains active application tiles and shortcuts for launching programs, sorted into groups. With a right-click, you can resize, turn off updating tiles (that is, they will become static instead of active), remove them from the Start menu (the “Unpin from Start Screen” item), or remove the program itself corresponding to the tile. By simply dragging the mouse, you can change the relative position of the tiles. You can also create application groups.

You can find the basic settings of the Start menu if you go through the path Settings-Personalization-Start or in the old fashioned way by clicking on the desktop with the right mouse button, in section Personalization.

Here you can turn off the display of frequently used and recently installed programs, as well as the list of transitions to them (opened by clicking on the arrow to the right of the name of the program in the list of frequently used ones). If you have a touch screen, you can enable the option « Open start screen screen in full screen mode, and the Start menu will look almost like the Windows 8. 1 Start screen, which can be useful for touch displays.

You can also choose what you want to display on the Start menu. To do this, open the option « Select , which folders will display in menu Start «. This will contribute to a more efficient use of the Start menu.

Don’t forget to also choose a color for the display of the Start menu, which will make it more in line with your vision and a pleasure to use. Personally, I’m tired of the dullness.

The Start button also retained one feature from Windows 8.1. When you right-click on it, a menu familiar to users from the previous version of the operating system appears. I use it often because access to some settings through it is very accessible.

By the way, for those who didn’t like the new Start menu in Windows 10, you can use the free Classic Shell program, StartIsBack and other similar utilities to return exactly the same Start as it was in Windows 7.

Why the «Search the Internet and

Windows» button?

The search box will be one of the first things you will notice when you start using Windows 10. It allows you to search both on the web and on your computer and is located in the taskbar next to the Start menu, where we usually place shortcuts for quick access to folders, programs or drives.

In the field itself, you can configure the voice assistant Cortana. Unfortunately, it is not yet available for our region, but over time, I’m sure Cortana will speak both Russian and Ukrainian. It’s just a matter of time.

I use this button often. Knowing the name of the program I need, I can easily find it without rummaging through the laptop settings.

I do not deny the fact that some do not like this button. Do they have little space on the taskbar, or does it annoy them, or do their knees tremble in front of Cortana, or does their religion not allow them to use it? There is a way for them to hide this interesting button.

To do this, right-click on Taskbar, search for Search and click Hidden. The hated search button will disappear from the taskbar. If you want to return it, you will have to follow the same path, but instead of the option Hidden click on Show search icon or Show search field.

Why virtual desktops in Windows 10?

Windows 10 comes with one very useful feature by default — the ability to support multiple virtual desktops. This function has been used for several years in Mac OS X, Linux and has proven itself very well.

What are virtual desktops for? To optimize the user experience or, to put it simply, for convenience and comfort. For example, when there is a dense and stressful work on a PC, there are often many applications open: a calculator, a browser, a Word document, media files, etc. In such cases, when several windows are open, it is easy to get confused when switching from one object to another.

With the help of virtual desktops, work can be organized more conveniently and productively. It’s like having several computers and monitors at hand. One would have a browser and a Word document open, another would have a calculator and organizer, a media player, and so on. By the way, an additional desktop is useful at work — to hide the contents from the authorities.

How to create them and how to use them? To organize work with programs and windows in certain areas, preferences, click on a special button in the “Taskbar”, which turns on the “Task View” mode.

Thumbnails of all running applications will appear, where you can select the currently required program. In the lower right corner is the “Create Desktop” icon, by clicking on which a new virtual desktop will appear.

If you go to it, then there will be no open applications — as if you just turned on the computer. Now you need to go to the first desktop, and from the thumbnails shown, drag the necessary program to the second desktop. It is possible to open the desired application in the newly created desktop. Those. complete creative freedom. The number of desktops is unlimited. When you close each desktop, the applications open in them are automatically moved to the adjacent desktop. The only thing missing is the ability to put a password on each desktop.

You can also customize what is shown on the Taskbar when opening virtual desktops. To do this, open Settings-System-Multitasking.

Hot keys for virtual tables

For those who want to switch between virtual tables more efficiently and quickly, there is a set of hot keys.

    • Win + Tab — access to all working folders and applications
    • Win+Ctrl+D — Creates a new Windows 9 desktop0161
    • Win+Ctrl+F4 — Closes the current Windows desktop
    • Win+Ctrl+left or right arrow — Switch between Windows desktops

The use of virtual desktops makes the user’s work much easier. Perhaps not everything will be clear the first time, but you just have to delve into the principle of work — things will run ahead of you.

How to set up the Action Center in Windows 10

The new operating system from Microsoft first introduced the Notification Center, familiar to everyone who has used modern smartphones for at least one day.

With the help of the notification center in the Windows 10 operating system, many system applications, as well as those installed from the Windows Store and many other programs, have the ability to display various notifications on the screen. Such information is distributed according to the display time, as well as according to the degree of its importance, and is displayed in the lower right corner of the screen.

If you expand the Notification Center, then at the bottom you can see buttons for quickly turning on different modes and performing the necessary actions. These panels can be edited and you can choose what you want to display. To do this, we will go through path Settings-System-Notifications and actions and we ourselves choose what and from where we will come to the Notification Center.

If, nevertheless, you do not need it or are simply tired, then you can turn it off. In the same place in Notifications and actions there is an option «Turn system signs on and off». Open it and simply turn off this feature. You can disable the Notification Center completely, but this is already using the registry. In inexperienced hands, it can harm the operation of the device.

In conclusion, I would like to wish you a pleasant work with your device. Customize it to your liking and preferences. Let working at a computer on Windows 10 bring you joy and a lot of positive emotions.

Multiple Windows Workers —

Microsoft Support

Windows 11 Windows 10 More…Less

Multiple desktops is great for organizing unrelated, ongoing projects or quickly switching desktops before a meeting.

Creating multiple desktops

  1. On the taskbar, select the Task Views icon and select New Desktop.

  2. Open the applications you want to use on this desktop.

  3. To switch to a different desktop, select Task view again.

Desktop background setting

You can also choose different backgrounds for each desktop if you are using a picture. If you are using a solid color or a slideshow, the background will be the same.

To change the background when using a picture:

  1. Right-click the desktop you want to change.

  2. Select Select background.

  3. Select list in section Background personalization and select Picture .

  4. Select a picture.