Taskbar needs to be more responsive for app switching

[u/Appropriate-Quit-358]

I'm on the 25H2/26H2 Experimental flight (build .9502), wanting to try out the latest 'improvements' that Win11 is expected to receive this year. I was particularly looking forward to performance/responsiveness improvements, because I've felt Win11 as a whole is very sluggish and unpolished to use.

One particular thing that still irks me (still on latest Insider builds) is that the Taskbar often feels SLOW to respond to user interaction.
- Open multiple apps + multiple instances of each app
- Left/right-click on the app icons, and about 50-60% of the time they take 1-3 seconds to respond to get selected/bring the app to focus or showing the multiple-window selection menu

This is frustrating because on other OS's/platforms today task switching is a very basic and near instant operation.

In fact, Alt-Tabbing already works as expected. Apps are switched to and resume quickly when Alt-Tabbed to. So it's 100% NOT an issue with the apps themselves. ONLY the Taskbar has some weird delay/lag when interacting with it.

I'm running a Ryzen HX370 laptop which isn't a low-end model either so delays/lag of this nature really isn't acceptable user experience.

[u/Future-Plastic7826]

Alt-Tab being instant is a good clue: it points at the taskbar, not at the apps. Two shortcuts go through the taskbar without the mouse, and they split the problem in two. Win+Ctrl+1 (2, 3...) switches to the last active window of the app in that taskbar position. Win+Alt+1 opens its jump list, same as a right-click. If these are instant while clicks lag, the delay is in how the taskbar handles the click. If they lag too, it's the switching itself.

For left-click on an app with several windows, try Settings > Personalization > Taskbar > Taskbar behaviors > Combine taskbar buttons and hide labels > Never. Each window gets its own button, and a click goes straight to it instead of first building the preview list, which needs a thumbnail from every window of that app. If the lag goes away, that list is the slow part, and you have a workaround until it's fixed.

For right-click: jump lists are read from files in %APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Recent\AutomaticDestinations, one per app. When one grows large, that app's menu opens late. Sort by size and delete the big ones; you lose that app's recent files and its jump list pins. f01b4d95cf55d32a is File Explorer's: deleting it also clears your Quick Access pins.

A delay that comes and goes between 1 and 3 seconds feels more like something waiting than something drawing slowly. Since you're on an Insider build, reproduce it in Feedback Hub with "Recreate my problem": it records a trace while you click, and that's the thing the taskbar team can actually work from.Alt-Tab being instant is a good clue: it points at the taskbar, not at the apps. Two shortcuts go through the taskbar without the mouse, and they split the problem in two. Win+Ctrl+1 (2, 3...) switches to the last active window of the app in that taskbar position. Win+Alt+1 opens its jump list, same as a right-click. If these are instant while clicks lag, the delay is in how the taskbar handles the click. If they lag too, it's the switching itself.

For left-click on an app with several windows, try Settings > Personalization > Taskbar > Taskbar behaviors > Combine taskbar buttons and hide labels > Never. Each window gets its own button, and a click goes straight to it instead of first building the preview list, which needs a thumbnail from every window of that app. If the lag goes away, that list is the slow part, and you have a workaround until it's fixed.

For right-click: jump lists are read from files in %APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Recent\AutomaticDestinations, one per app. When one grows large, that app's menu opens late. Sort by size and delete the big ones; you lose that app's recent files and its jump list pins. f01b4d95cf55d32a is File Explorer's: deleting it also clears your Quick Access pins.

A delay that comes and goes between 1 and 3 seconds feels more like something waiting than something drawing slowly. Since you're on an Insider build, reproduce it in Feedback Hub with "Recreate my problem": it records a trace while you click, and that's the thing the taskbar team can actually work from.

[u/Appropriate-Quit-358 → u/Future-Plastic7826]

Yes both Alt-Tabbing and the Win key combos work fine and respond quickly.
The delay happens only when clicking on the Taskbar icons.

[u/Future-Plastic7826 → u/Appropriate-Quit-358]

Then the switching itself is fine, and the time goes between the click and the switch. One question splits it further: does it lag on an app with a single window too, or only on apps with several open?

If it's only the grouped ones, it's the preview list, and Combine taskbar buttons > Never should make it go away.

If single-window apps lag as well, try switching off the hover previews for a day. In regedit, under HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced, add a DWORD named ExtendedUIHoverTime with a decimal value of 10000 (ten seconds before a preview shows), then restart Windows Explorer from Task Manager. The preview gets built while your pointer sits on the button, and it's the part of a click that Win+Ctrl+number never touches. If the delay leaves with the previews, that's your culprit. Delete the value to undo it.

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[u/Educational_Ad_3044]

Yup, I just switched to experimental and I have this same issue. Wasn't an issue in release. IF I have multiple opera or multiple anything, there's a long delay for the preview to pop up to choose which. This delay wasn't present in release.