Η Microsoft started activating advertisements within the Start menu for all users. After a short trial period with them Windows Insiders earlier this month, Microsoft began rolling out the update this week KB5036980 to Windows 11 users, which includes “suggestions” for apps from the Microsoft Store directly in the Start menu.
In the update notes for the latest public version of Windows 11, Microsoft states: “The 'Featured' section of the Start menu will show some Microsoft Store apps. These apps come from a small curated set of developers.” The ads are intended to help Windows 11 users discover more apps, but will largely benefit developers Microsoft is trying to entice to make more apps for Windows.
It's surprising that Microsoft is rolling out this "feature" so quickly, as it only started testing these ads two weeks ago. At the time, it was reported that Microsoft "could decide to drop these ads" if there was enough feedback that they weren't popular. However, two weeks of feedback is certainly not enough to determine this.
Fortunately, you can disable these ads, or “suggestions” as Microsoft calls them. If you have the latest update KB5036980 installed, go to Settings > Personalization > Start and turn off “Show suggestions for tips, Offers applications and more". While the KB5036980 update is currently optional, Microsoft will make it mandatory for all Windows 11 PCs in the coming weeks.
Microsoft's move to enable ads in the Windows 11 Start menu follows similar ad placements on the lock screen and Windows 10 Start menu. Additionally, Microsoft last year began testing ads inside Windows 11's File Explorer, before disabling the experiment and states that the test was "not intended for external publication". Hopefully this experiment will remain just that, an experiment.
