If you want to pin Portable apps to the Start Menu in Windows 11/10, then this article might come in handy for you. Portable apps are those apps that do not need to be installed. If you use a particular portable app frequently and you want to pin it in the Start Menu so that you can open it whenever possible, read on.
How to Pin Portable apps to Start Menu in Windows 11/10
To pin Portable apps shortcuts to the Start Menu in Windows 11/10, follow these steps-
- Move the downloaded portable app folder to a directory of your choice
- Double-click on the .exe file to open the portable app.
- Close the app.
- Right-click on the .exe file.
- Select Send to > Desktop (create shortcut).
- Open Start Menu folder in File Explorer.
- Go to Programs directory.
- Move the app shortcut from Desktop to Programs directory.
- Find the app in the Start Menu.
To know more about these steps, you should keep reading.
Pin Portable apps to Start Menu in Windows
In this case, as an example, we are going to use Ultimate Windows Tweaker for Windows. However, the process to pin any portable app to the Start Menu is the same.
First, download the portable app and unzip the file. If your app doesn’t come in a zip file, you don’t need to follow this step.
After that, place the app and all the downloaded files into the directory of your choice.
Next, double-click on the .exe file to open the app. Some portable apps create additional files and folders to store data locally.
Once it is done, you may close the app window.
Finally, right-click on the portable app, and select Send to > Desktop (create shortcut) to create a shortcut on your Desktop.
Now, you need to locate and open the Start Menu folder. For that, you can open File Explorer on your computer and navigate to this path-
C:\Users\<yourusername>\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs
Move the newly created portable app shortcut from the Desktop to the Start Menu folder.
If you want to pin multiple apps and keep them together, you can create a new directory in the Programs folder and move all the shortcuts here.
After doing this, you will find the portable app shortcut in the Start Menu.
In Windows11, you could also simply search for the portable app, then select Pin to Start, and the app exe file will get pinned.
That’s it!
I hope you find this small tip useful.
Read: Free Startup Manager software for Windows.
How do I pin an app to the Start menu in Windows 11?
Click the Start button icon at the bottom center of your screen. The Start menu will appear. Click the All apps button. Scroll through the list of installed apps and locate the app you want to pin. You can also type the name of the app in the Search bar at the top to find it quickly. Right-click on the app and select the Pint to Start option from the context menu. The app will now appear in the pinned section of your Start menu.
How do I add a portable app to startup?
To add a portable app to Windows Startup, open File Explorer and navigate to the portable app’s executable file (.exe). Right-click on the executable and select Send to > Desktop (create shortcut). Press Win+R to open the Run dialog. Type shell:startup and press Enter. This command will open the Startup folder for your user account in File Explorer. Go back to the Desktop and copy the shortcut of the portable app. Paste this shortcut in the Startup folder. This will ensure the app launches automatically when you boot your computer.
Read Next: Pin to Start Menu not working or greyed out in Windows.
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