Windows 11 Beta Build Reworks The File Explorer Right-Click Menu

The first section lets you toggle built-in commands like Send to or Create shortcut, and it can also surface options that Windows 11 had quietly dropped, including Print. The second section governs app extensions: whether they show up in the main menu or get tucked into a submenu, and whether that submenu appears at all. The third section handles placement of the everyday commands, Cut, Copy, Paste, Rename, Delete, and Share. Testers can list them inline rather than as a row of icons, which pulls the layout closer to how Windows 10 did it, and Properties can be pushed down to the very bottom of the menu.

It's a modest set of knobs, but it's the first time Microsoft has let people reshape the context menu's structure rather than just live with whatever Windows or an installed app decided to put there.

Settings gets quietly faster, maybe

Build 26220.9757 also includes work on the Settings home page, which Microsoft says should load faster in certain scenarios. No benchmark numbers came with the announcement, so how much faster, and in which scenarios, is something testers will have to judge for themselves as the build spreads.

And that spread is gradual by design. Beta Channel features typically roll out in waves, so not every Insider on 26220.9757 will see the new menu or the Settings change immediately. Insiders tracking the separate 26H1 branch are on a different build entirely, 28020.3292, and won't get this update through that channel.

Microsoft's usual caveat applies here too: anything shipped to Insiders can be delayed, reworked, or scrapped before it reaches a stable release. The context menu redesign has been in testing since August, which suggests Microsoft is reasonably committed to it, but there's no date yet for when it lands outside the Beta Channel, or whether it ships as part of 25H2 servicing or waits for a later Windows 11 release.