If when you right-click on any program icon or folder, the Pin to Start context menu item is not working or is missing in Windows 11/10, then you will have to make changes to the Group Policy. If your edition of Windows 11/10 does not ship with GPEDIT, then you can always edit the Windows Registry. Windows Home users may therefore need to edit the Registry.
Pin to Start not working or missing in Windows 11/10
If Pin to Start is not working or is missing on your Windows 11/10 computer, then use GPEDIT or REGEDIT to fix the issue. You may also re-register the Shell32.dll file and see if that helps. Before you begin, you may want to create a system restore point and/or backup your Registry first.
Using Group Policy Editor
Type gpedit.msc in the taskbar search and click open the Group Policy Editor.
Now navigate to the following setting:
User Configuration > Administrative Templates > Start Menu and Taskbar
In the right pane, double-click on Prevent users from customizing their Start screen to open its Properties.
This policy setting allows you to prevent users from changing their Start screen layout. If you enable this setting, you will prevent a user from selecting an app, resizing a tile, pinning or unpinning a tile or a secondary tile, entering the customize mode and rearranging tiles within Start and Apps. If you disable or do not configure this setting, you will allow a user to select an app, resize a tile, pin/unpin a tile or a secondary tile, enter the customize mode and rearrange tiles within Start and Apps.
Change the configuration to Not configured or Disabled.
While here, you may also want to ensure that the Start Layout policy is also set to Not configured or Disabled.
Using Registry
If your Windows 11/10 does not have the Group Policy Editor, Run regedit to open the Windows Registry.
Next, navigate to the following registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer
In the right pane, see if NoChangeStartMenu exists. If it does, right-click on it and select Delete. Or you may give it a value of 0.
Now navigate to the following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer
Look for and delete the LockedStartLayout DWORD, if it exists. Or you may give it a value of 0.
Restart your computer and see if the Pin to Start context menu option works for you.
Re-register Shell32.dll
If one of the above options does not help you, you might want to re-register the Shell32.dll file, by running the following command in an elevated command prompt window:
regsvr32 /i shell32.dll
Here regsvr32 is a command-line utility used for registering and un-registering OLE controls like DLLs and ActiveX controls in the Windows Registry, Shell32.dll is the file that handles shell API calls and the /i parameter calls the DLLInstall function.
Hope something helps you.
Related: How to Add or Remove Pin to Start from Context Menu.
May I make a suggestion to TWC? When you make references to “Group Policy” and other features that are found only in the higher end Windows editions (Pro or Enterprise) — could you please indicate so right off the bat? I imagine most of your readers here are individual (or consumer) Windows users who have access mainly to the lower-end Windows editions (like Win 10 Home). Otherwise, this can be very confusing — causing casual Windows users (like me) to go off searching for the features you described — only to fail for the above reasons (not having high-end Windows). Thanks!
I usually mention “If your edition of Windows 10 does not ship with GPEDIT, then you can always edit the Windows Registry”, but sure I will mention this here too.
For which app or for all apps?
After following all the other advice I was about desperate enough to do the factory reset as suggested above, but I came across https://superuser.com/a/1252166/528020 on superuser and it did the job!
“Try renaming the Registry key HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionCloudStore to something else, for example CloudStore.bak. Afterwards, log out and log in again. The key will be regenerated, and you will lose some settings (night light, personalizations in the Settings app) along with your Start menu layout.”
YESSSSSS! THANK YOU! This worked perfectly!