My 5 Favorite Windows Keyboard Shortcuts

Sometimes It’s so Obvious, We Miss It

I have a hard time changing old habits, but have really made a concerted effort to incrementally move forward with keyboard shortcuts.

Here are five that I have started using regularly that have made a big impact on my work productivity:

Toggle and Select Open Window or Application

• “ALT + TAB” — toggles between open windows

ALT + TAB to toggle open Windows

Open New File Explorer Window

• “WIN + E” — Open new File Explorer Window

“WIN + E” opens new File Explorer Window

Empty Recycle Bin

• “CTRL + ALT + E” — Empties Recycle Bin (This is a custom shortcut I created using NirCmd (you can download it here). NirCmd is an open source utility tool — very slick.

The following article does a great job of stepping through how to do this — it’s easy!

How to empty Recycle Bin with hotkey or one-click shortcut in Windows [Guide]

Snap Active Window to Left or Right Side of Monitor

• “WIN + →” & WIN + ←” — Snaps the active window to the Right or Left side of the screen. (→ and ← indicates Right or Left arrow key).

“WIN + ←” snaps Window to Left

“WIN + →” snaps Window to Right

Minimize or Maximize the Active Window

• “WIN + UP arrow key” & “WIN + DOWN arrow key” — Maximize or Minimize the active Window.

“WIN + Down Arrow” to Minimize

Minimized Window

NOTE: If you want to FULLY minimize the active Window, then the keyboard shortcut is “WIN + DOWN + DOWN” (down arrow key twice)

Those are my “fab 5”! Do you have any windows keyboard shortcuts that you would recommend?

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