In October 2021, Microsoft shipped a Windows 11 taskbar that could only live at the bottom of your screen. Nearly five years later, you can finally park it on the top, left, or right edge again, just like Windows 10 did.
That’s the main change in KB5124008, the September 2026 Patch Tuesday update, and it isn’t the only thing Microsoft is giving us back. The KB5120998 preview notes list Start menu size options and independent toggles for each Start section, and KB5124008 carried those into the mandatory September update. Almost none of this is new; this update is Windows 11 reversing decisions Microsoft made at launch, which is why it’s the best update in years. It’s also incomplete: you still can’t drag the taskbar to a new edge, Start still doesn’t resize freely, and a staged rollout means you may not see any of it yet.
The five-year road to fixing the interface
Restripping the core interface to build a new foundation
When Windows 11 launched in 2021, it stripped away decades of established workflow habits. Power users lost drag-and-drop file opening on taskbar icons, the deep right-click context menu was replaced with a bare-bones Taskbar Settings link, and the bar was locked to the screen’s bottom edge. Microsoft defended these omissions as necessary trade-offs while rebuilding the taskbar from scratch.
Over the next two years, Microsoft trickled basic functionality back through incremental patches, restoring drag-and-drop in 2022, Task Manager’s right-click shortcut later that year, and full window labels by late 2023. However, the taskbar itself remained pinned at the bottom.
The taskbar moves again
A long-awaited fix arrives with real physical limitations
The ability to move your taskbar appeared earlier this year when Microsoft provided Experimental build 26300.8493 to Insiders in May 2026, introducing top, left, and right alignment options alongside a compact taskbar setting. That test worked its way into the August preview update before officially rolling out to everyone in the September 8 security release, KB5124008. Moving the bar is as simple as heading to Settings > Personalization > Taskbar > Taskbar behaviors and picking your preferred edge from the new position dropdown. As welcome as this restoration is, it isn’t a total return to Windows 10 functionality. There are still notable feature gaps: you cannot click and drag the taskbar to a new edge on the fly, auto-hiding breaks on every edge except the bottom, and parking the bar vertically strips away the full search box in favor of a basic icon.
Start gets its controls back, sort of
More layout options, but no true freeform sizing
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The Start menu is getting a similar treatment. Under the layout settings introduced in KB5120998 and KB5124008, you get much better control over screen real estate by choosing explicit Small or Large preset layouts, toggling Pinned items, Recommended files, and All Apps on or off independently, or hiding your account profile picture to trim clutter. While these new toggles give you a cleaner layout, they do not bring back the freeform corner-dragging resize behavior that made the Windows 10 Start menu so adaptable. You are picking from pre-set templates rather than building your own grid.
Shut down finally means shut down
Bypassing forced update delays when you just want to turn off your PC.
Microsoft also appears to be fixing one of the most persistent daily annoyances in Windows management: forced update stalls when powering off. Starting in Insider build 26300.8289, the company updated the Power menu logic so it always displays standard Restart and Shut down commands right alongside “Update and Restart.”
This change should hit your machine soon, allowing you to turn off your rig without being held hostage by a seemingly endless patch installation. Because Microsoft omitted this specific tweak from the official KB5124008 patch notes, you will want to test your own Power menu options after updating to confirm your build has received the server-side toggle.
Why you might not see any of this yet
Staged rollouts and lingering update bugs
Installing KB5124008 won’t guarantee these changes will show up on your desktop right away, however, as Microsoft’s Controlled Feature Rollout (CFR) process flips feature flags on in waves that can take days or weeks to appear. Applying the patch also comes with typical OS upgrade risks. Microsoft’s Release Health dashboard flagged four key bugs tied to the release: Remote Desktop hanging, and broken Linux VM folder sharing in Hyper-V, both of which were resolved through an out-of-band KB5129195 patch, alongside USB audio connection drops on certain external DACs and enterprise domain trust losses, which remain on temporary mitigations while we wait for more permanent fixes.
A long-overdue surrender
Giving users back their taskbar options may not be a bold leap into computing’s future, but it’s a solid step forward, even if it reads more like a company surrender to five years of steady user complaints.
KB5124008 marks a necessary step toward fixing a fractured desktop experience, even if it’s a bittersweet victore. Five years of waiting delivered basic layout toggles, while drag-and-drop taskbar moving and freeform Start menu resizing remain entirely missing. Update your system for the security fixes and grab the top taskbar if you miss it, though.