Back in the 1990s, Windows power users often availed themselves of a set of small, free software tools from Microsoft collectively known as PowerToys. (Read about their history at Wikipedia.) Microsoft abandoned these mini-utilities during the Windows Vista, 7, and 8 years but reintroduced them in May 2019 as an open-source project on GitHub.In both incarnations, these tools have always sought to help out with everyday tasks, such as resizing images; creating easy-to-use Windows desktop layouts; running programs; or looking up keyboard shortcuts. Handy stuff! Theres a lot more going on in the current crop of PowerToys than many readers might know about, so its a good idea to survey whats inside that toybox. While some of the original 90s PowerToys have been re-created and updated for Windows 10 and 11, many others are brand new. Recently, the PowerToys team has even started adding elements of the venerable Sysinternals toolkit (e.g., ZoomIt) into the mix.Heres an introduction to the two-dozen-plus PowerToys available today and how to take advantage of these highly useful, compact, and capable tools.In this article:Obtaining and installing PowerToysUsing PowerToysMeet the Windows PowerToysWhats coming for PowerToysObtaining and installing PowerToysUnlike the 90s tools, which had to be downloaded and installed individually, theres now a single PowerToys app that gives users access to all available PowerToys tools in one go. When this app was introduced in 2019, it was available only through GitHub.Its still available that way: visit the PowerToys GitHub page, click the Latest release icon at lower right, then download and install the .exe that matches your target PC x64 or ARM64, per-user or machine-wide. (I recommend machine-wide because it will work for all users on a given PC.)But a GitHub visit is no longer necessary. Instead you can get the PowerToys app from the Microsoft Store (and take advantage of its auto-update capabilities).Or you can use the built-in Windows package manager, WinGet, to install (and then update) it at the command line if you prefer. To install the latest version, open an administrative Windows Terminal session (either PowerShell or Command Prompt will work) and type:Winget install PowerToysThen, to update PowerToys automatically or directly, type:Winget upgrade all include-unknown #updates all incl PowerToysWinget upgrade PowerToys #only updates PowerToysFor more information on installing PowerToys, visit the Installing PowerToys page at Microsoft Learn.Once youve got PowerToys installed on a PC, you can open the app by searching on PowerToys in the Windows search box or typing PowerToys into the Run box. Youre good to go.Using PowerToysBy default, PowerToys is a startup item, so it fires off once the Windows desktop appears after boot-up. It becomes part of the Windows runtime that way, and makes its tools available using their keyboard shortcuts any time you need them.To access PowerToys settings, tools, and info, click its icon in the notification area at the right-hand side of the Windows 10 or 11 taskbar. This brings up a Shortcuts window with access to various PowerToys, and some key buttons, as shown in Figure 1.Figure 1: Click on the PowerToys icon in the taskbars notifications area to pop up this menu.Ed Tittel / FoundryWhat you see in this Shortcuts menu is an abbreviated list of PowerToys tools. If you click More, you can access All apps with a scrolling control at the far right.Look at the buttons at the lower right in Figure 1. The page icon (left) takes you to the Microsoft Learn pages for PowerToys where the whole shebang is described, documented, and depicted. The debug icon (middle) creates a bug report file from PowerToys and deposits it on your desktop. Youre supposed to visit the Issues page at the PowerToys GitHub home, and may use that information as part of a New issue filing if you find that necessary.The real action is from the rightmost icon, which shows the familiar Settings gear. As you might guess, this takes you to PowerToys Settings, where the Dashboard pane (shown in Figure 2) appears by default.Figure 2: The PowerToys Dashboard presents toggles for all PowerToys and shows their current state. (Partial image: there are too many to show at once!)Ed Tittel / FoundryThis Dashboard is helpful in showing you the status (on or off) for all PowerToys. Note that the PowerToys are organized into five categories, which appear at the left in Figure 2:System Tools: Various controls over OS appearance and desktop or app window contents (includes Advanced Paste, Awake, Color Picker, PowerToys Run, Screen Ruler, Shortcut Guide, Text Extractor, and ZoomIt).Windowing & Layouts: Tools to control how windows on the desktop interact, stack, and get arranged (includes Always On Top, Crop and Lock, FancyZones, and Workspaces).Input / Output: Tools for mouse and keyboard management and control (includes Keyboard Manager, Mouse utilities, Mouse Without Borders, and Quick Accent).File Management: A plethora of File Explorer add-ins (context menus, usually) and file controls (includes File Explorer add-ons, File Locksmith, Image Resizer, New+, Peek, and PowerRename).Advanced: A grab-bag of tools for command line, networking, and registry access aimed at savvy power users (includes Command Not Found, Environment Variables, Hosts File Editor, and Registry Preview).The General item near the top of that left-hand list is also worth getting to know; its where youll find global info about and general settings for PowerToys (partially shown in Figure 3).Figure 3: The General settings pane provides version info, an update button, and other PowerToys controls.Ed Tittel / FoundryThis is the pane where you can see that PowerToys will Run at startup by default. You can also guide how PowerToys behaves when run in administrator mode, what it looks and acts like, adjust backup and restore settings, and enable or disable use of experimental features. (The PowerToys team, under the able direction of team lead Clint Rutkas, issues regular previews with experimental or planned features.)Meet the Windows PowerToysThe initial set of eight PowerToys released in 2019 has now more than tripled, with new tools rolling out steadily. As I wrote this story, the total count was 26 across the categories mentioned earlier. (In the list that follows, I present the PowerToys in alphabetical order, not by category.) Inside PowerToys, youll find a lot to learn, like, play with, and put to good use.Advanced Paste: Lets you manipulate the format for clipboard content. You can paste whatever youve cut as plain text, markdown, or .json using the tool directly, or more simply with direct keystroke sequences. (By default, Win key + Shift + V opens the Advanced Paste tool, and Win key + Ctrl +Alt + V pastes as plain text.) Youll find additional clipboard controls and key combinations (paste as file, as .txt file, as .png file, and as .html file) as well, as shown in Figure 4. Theres even an AI-based function, but it requires users to supply their own OpenAI key to put it to work.Figure 4: The Advanced Paste PowerToy includes AI options, clipboard controls, and various key combos for quick use.Ed Tittel / FoundryAlways On Top: Keeps an open window pinned on the top display layer so that its always visible. Once enabled, its shortcut key combo is Win key + Ctrl + T. It plays a brief sound as it pins any window and shows a thick blue border around pinned windows for easy recognition all configurable in the settings. You can even create an exclusion list to prevent certain apps from responding to this tool. Always on Top works best when you have ample screen real estate; I use it mostly on multi-monitor setups.Awake: Keeps a PC awake independent of its power and sleep settings. Its primarily designed to enable completion of long-running tasks that might otherwise be interrupted or paused by sleep kicking in or the display(s) turning off. Figure 5 shows the options available to control how long the PC stays awake.Figure 5: Awake lets you control wake behavior and keep the display on as well.Ed Tittel / FoundryColor Picker: A small widget that lets users obtain codes for colors anywhere in the visible display area(s) in Windows 10 or 11 (HEX, RGB, HSL, CMYK, etc.). Once its enabled, press Win key + Shift + C to activate Color Picker, then select a color on your screen. Color Picker copies the colors code in the format youve set (HEX, RGB, HSL, CMYK, etc.) to the clipboard so you can easily paste it into a graphics program, HTML markup, or anyplace else you might need such a color code.Command Not Found (CNF): A PowerShell (PS) module that snags the PS error code for an unrecognized command, then looks up and offers to install plausible WinGet packages if theyre available. Behind the scenes, this adds an item to the Windows Terminal profile and makes sure PS 7.4 (or higher) is running and that the WinGet Client PowerShell module is installed. The net result is depicted in Figure 6. (Visit CNFs settings for more info.)Figure 6: After the error message (red) appears, CNF takes over to suggest possible vim installs.Ed Tittel / FoundryCrop and Lock: Lets you create a smaller window in which to display an application (called Reparent mode and triggered by the keyboard shortcut Win key + Ctrl + Shift + R) or show a desktop thumbnail (Thumbnail mode, with shortcut key combo Win key + Ctrl + Shift + T). Either way, position the cursor inside the app window you wish to crop and lock, enter the key combo, and a crosshair (+) cursor will appear. Use that to crop the app window, and there you go (opens a new, smaller-sized window).Environment Variables: Provides access to a standalone app that lets you see, create, edit, or remove environment variables that Windows uses to control its behavior and to identify and access system resources (e.g., Path, OneDrive, OS, and so forth). The controls are dead simple, and the app provides standard user or administrative access to Profiles, Default, System, and Applied variables in the Windows environment, as shown in Figure 7. Its much handier than the old Control Panel item, which restricts window size severely.Figure 7: The Environment Variables app lets you create, edit, and remove variables and profiles in Windows.Ed Tittel / FoundryFancyZones: Like Windows Snap functionality on steroids, this window manager tool lets you create windows layouts for multiple usage scenarios and multitasking between and among them. Shortcut key combo: Win key + `(grave accent or backtick; its on the same key as ~ in US QWERTY layout). See Figure 8 for a glimpse of FancyZones easy-to-use controls.Figure 8: FancyZones makes it easy to set up and use complex window arrangements.Ed Tittel / FoundryFile Explorer add-ons: Originally released as FE Preview, this PowerToy provides toggles to show miniature SVG files on the File Explorer preview pane, or within thumbnails. This tool also enables previews or thumbnails for Markdown (.md, .mdown, .mkdn, ) files, source code files (.txt, .cpp, .py, .json, .xml, ), geometric code, Portable Document Format (.pdf), and Quite OK image files (.qoi).File Locksmith: Checks if a file or folder (and sub-contents) is in use and, if so, which processes are using it. To use it, open File Explorer, then hold down the Shift key, right-click a file or folder, and choose Unlock with File Locksmith from the pop-up menu. As shown in Figure 9, a sub-window appears listing the tasks (if any) using the file. If you want to stop the process from running, click End task.Figure 9: File Locksmith lets you see the process(es) using a file in this case, the Chrome browser.Ed Tittel / FoundryHosts File Editor: In a typical TCP/IP networking environment, a local file named Hosts predefines domain names and IP addresses to give the IP host/address resolution process a jump start. Indeed, Windows checks this file first before it uses the Domain Name Service (DNS), to turn human-readable domain names (such as Microsoft.com) into machine-usable IP addresses (such as 20.70.246.20, among many others).The Hosts File Editor PowerToy launches a standalone app that provides guided access to view and edit the Hosts file in Windows. (Be careful! As the app warns, you can bollix up internet access editing this file incorrectly.) For a good overview of the pros, cons, and best uses for a customized hosts file in Windows, see this 2020 LoginRadius blog post Benefits and usages of Hosts File.Image Resizer: Provides drag-and-drop or right-click context menu access (Resize with Image Resizer) to resize graphics files, alter graphics file formats, or rename them as desired. This tool not only lets you define your own dimensions for small, medium, large, and phone images, you can add new named image types for more customized captures as well. Figure 10 shows the Image Resizer pop-up control when its entry is selected from the right-click menu.Figure 10: Image Resizers pop-up applet makes it quick and easy to resize image files.Ed Tittel / FoundryKeyboard Manager: Provides a toggle that lets users remap keyboard keys to other keys or shortcuts, or remap shortcuts to other shortcuts or keys. Once turned on, you can remap keys on your keyboard, or you can remap existing shortcuts into different ones. To really understand what this tool can do (and why it can sometimes be a real boon), browse the Microsoft Learn article Keyboard Manager utility.Mouse utilities: A collection of mouse tools that includes Find My Mouse (press Ctrl twice fairly quickly), Mouse Highlighter (Win key + H), Mouse Jump (disabled by default, Win key + Shift + D), and Mouse Pointer Crosshairs (disabled by default, Win key + Alt + P). Each comes with an on/off toggle, plus various simple controls. Try them out to see how they work and look. Of all of them, I use Find My Mouse most often: double-click Ctrl and a white circle pops up around the mouse.Mouse Without Borders (MWB): I remember Mouse Without Borders as an old Microsoft Garage project. (Wikipedia says it made its public debut in September 2011.) Simply put, MWB lets you use a single mouse to track its cursor across the screens of multiple Windows devices configured to interact and communicate with one another. Thus, unlike most other PowerToys, MWB requires initial setup and configuration.First, it must be enabled (its off by default). Then a shared key must be generated and used to get the devices talking to each other, after which a layout can be arranged. There are all kinds of controls that come into play: a dozen for behavior, five keyboard shortcuts, and a smattering of advanced settings and troubleshooting tools. Figure 11 shows two of my laptops (P16 and X380, from left to right) set up to permit the cursor to track between them.Figure 11: MWB lets you arrange systems (two laptops in this case) in line to track the cursor across them.Ed Tittel / FoundryNew+: Lets you create files and folders from your own personalized template set. You can use it to set up text, Office, and other files with predefined info. For instance, you could create a file with the address block, date placeholder, and recipient placeholder for a business letter; another with layouts and column heads for invoice spreadsheets; and others for commonly needed files for everyday use. The New+ settings let you change the default template location and hide filename extensions and starting characters.Peek: Another File Explorer extension that provides quick, transient access to file previews. Highlight a file, press Ctrl + spacebar, and a preview window opens. This works especially well for screencaps; as demonstrated in Figure 12, its easy to see details captured in a screenshot without actually opening the image file. (Notice the Peek icon up top, a magnifying glass on a file folder.) Peek has very simple controls, too.Figure 12: Highlight a file, press Ctrl + spacebar, and get the preview.Ed Tittel / FoundryPowerRename: Provides a context menu entry (Windows Shell extension) for advanced bulk file renaming in File Explorer using search and replace or regular expression syntax (regex). Regex is an extremely powerful technique, and its a good idea to have some knowledge of how it works before you use PowerRename to mess around with real, live files on your PC. Microsoft Learn has a nice regex tutorial for Visual Studio that covers the basics of characters, operators, constructs, and patterns.Figure 13 shows me renaming some of the image files for this very story: its a useful tool.Figure 13: I highlighted four filenames and Shift-clicked to open this PowerRename window. Its set up to replace pt25 with PowToy25.Ed Tittel / FoundryPowerToys Run: A quick pop-up launcher that works like the Run command window. Shortcut key combo: Alt + spacebar. Note that these keys are adjacent on US QWERTY keyboards for super-quick access and use. Its faster and easier to access than the Run box, and its search function is likewise lightning fast. Click any item in the search results to launch and go.Figure 14 shows a generic PowerToys Run box that puts its capabilities on display: run executables; calculate simple equations; search previous inputs, files, folders and programs; and navigate the Registry. The better you know it, the better youll like it!Figure 14: Press Alt + spacebar to get this nifty box offering a variety of instant actions.Ed Tittel / FoundryQuick Accent: Longtime windows users know they can use all kinds of Esc and Alt key combos to emit odd and interesting characters from Windows keyboards. Quick Accent provides another way to access accents, fractions, diacritical marks, and other characters using a more visual approach.As you can see in Figure 15, holding down the 1 key and hitting the left arrow puts lots of 1s down before the accent bar pops up above, with various sub- and superscript options plus fractions with a 1 numerator. Interesting!Figure 15: The Quick Accent bar appears above the Notepad window: thats where you pick the character you want.Ed Tittel / FoundryThis one takes some playing with to get used to but can then be quite handy. When you dont need the Quick Accent toolbar anymore, you must disable this PowerToy to make it vanish.Registry Preview: Provides a clean, simple look at the contents of any Windows Registry file. You can launch this app from PowerToys Settings > Registry Preview, or else hold down the Shift key when you click on a .reg file in File Explorer, then select Preview from the resulting pop-up menu. Those who occasionally (or regularly) work on the Registry directly will find this a pleasant, lightweight alternative to RegEdit.exe.Screen Ruler: Provides a simple, visual way to measure pixels on a Windows display. It also includes horizontal and vertical measurement capability; offers continuous measuring; and provides color, color edge, and edge detection controls (see PowerToys Settings > Screen Ruler for all the details). Its shortcut key combo is Win key + Shift + M.Figure 16 shows the ruler at work, showing the pixel count between two desktop background elements. As with Quick Accent, you must disable Screen Ruler to turn off the top center ruler toolbar when you dont wish to see or use it.Figure 16: A faint red line labeled 345 shows the distance in pixels from the circle to the logo.Ed Tittel / FoundryShortcut Guide: A context-sensitive listing of keyboard shortcuts that shows up in Windows 10 or 11 when shortcut key combo Win key + Shift + / (right-slash) is pressed. If opened on the desktop (as in Figure 17), it shows Windows shortcuts. Opened inside any application, it shows that apps shortcuts instead. Hit Esc to close the guide. One of my personal favorites, this tool helps me remember more shortcuts than my poor brain can hold.Figure 17: Combined with the Windows key, these are the basic Windows shortcuts, neatly laid out in Shortcut Guide.Ed Tittel / FoundryText Extractor: Copies text from any portion of the Windows display, including inside images or videos. Microsoft recommends using the relatively new Text actions capability inside the Snipping Tool instead of this tool. Indeed, Text Extractor is disabled by default. But when enabled, it responds to the shortcut key combo Win key + Shift + T.Once you define a rectangular region on screen, Text Extractor parses all text it finds into the clipboard. You can then paste that text into an editor or text input of your choice. I used it to grab the end of the Lenovo logo on my desktop, which you can see pasted into Notepad in Figure 18.Figure 18: When I trace a rectangle around novo (white text on red background), Text Extractor pastes it into Notepad.Ed Tittel / FoundryWorkspaces: A tool for grouping a set of applications together, with positioning control and unique configuration settings. The shortcut to launch this tool, if enabled, is Win key + Ctrl + ` (grave accent or backtick). Pressing that shortcut opens the Workspaces editor and lets you choose from predefined layouts (called Templates) or create your own unique layout (called Custom).You can see a custom workspace in Figure 19, which shows Chrome at left, PowerToys above and Edge below in the center, and Copilot to the right. Figure 19: Workspaces makes it easy to set up and switch among common working scenarios.Ed Tittel / FoundryWorkspaces is helpful when you run specific work scenarios and need groups of applications to make them fly. (See The ultimate Windows app launcher for more info.) Works on both single and multiple monitor setups.ZoomIt: A longtime favorite among Sysinternals users, PowerToys has brought this nifty screen zoom, annotation, and recording tool under the PowerToys umbrella. Its a great addition for those whove never used it; its even more convenient for longtime Sysinternals fans and users (like yours truly, who had the pleasure of writing for Winternals in Austin in the 1990s). The best way to dig into ZoomIt is to read the Microsoft Learn article ZoomIt utility, which includes an animated demo that shows you exactly how it works.This concludes the overview of the current PowerToys lineup as of early February 2025. For more about working with PowerToys, see 10 PowerToys you should use on Windows.In the next section, youll learn a bit about what the PowerToys team is thinking about and working on, by way of possible new PowerToys.Whats coming for PowerToysIf you visit the PowerToys roadmap, youll see information about what the Microsoft development team currently has in its sights. (Shortcut Guide v2 gets my vote.) But because PowerToys is an open-source effort and takes input from countless volunteers who contribute ideas and code, this doesnt cover everything that might show up in the toybox.Given those provisos and qualifications, heres a short-ish list of whats up with possible enhancements or new PowerToys:The in-house team is always working on the PowerToys installer and UI bits and pieces (including the taskbar icon, flyout menu, and more). Right now if you look back at Figure 1 youll see that the PowerToys that function as apps (e.g. Color Picker, Environment Variables, FancyZones, Hosts File Editor, PowerToys Run, Text Extractor, Registry Preview, Screen Ruler, Shortcut Guide, and Workspaces) all appear as icons on that flyout menu. As these items come and go, this lineup will change to match.Each new PowerToys release comes with release notes that include a Whats New section. This is a great way to find (and see) what kinds of things are popping up inside the toybox.PowerToys works well with the WinGet package manager and includes its own update button on the General pane in PowerToys Settings. It provides notifications when updates are ready and makes it easy to update. Personally, I tend to catch updates through WinGet because I run it on my Windows systems every other day.In online forums recently, PowerToys team lead Clint Rutkas has teased adding transcoding capabilities for audio and video files within the Advanced Paste PowerToy.Given that the Sysinternals tool ZoomIt is now integrated into PowerToys, one has to ponder the possibility that others in that collection may make their way into the toybox, too. Learn more about the outstanding Sysinternals tool set at its Microsoft home page.Dont you need some PowerToys?As somebody whos used some of these wonderful programs and extensions since the late 1990s, my own opinion on using PowerToys is an emphatic Yes! May I have another? But youll have to try them out for yourself and see how you like them if youre not using them already. If you are, hopefully youve seen something new or intriguing here that youll want to try out. Enjoy!This story was originally launched in October 2020 and updated in February 2025.