Three applications that have been part of Windows for decades may soon become optional features… meaning you’ll be able to remove them if you don’t use them.

The latest Windows 10 Insider Preview builds let users uninstall Microsoft Paint, Notepad, and WordPad.

Windows Latest

Microsoft hasn’t made any official announcements, but the folks at Windows Latest spotted the change in recent Windows 10 Insider Preview builds.

Note that in this case, optional means opt-in by default. NotePad, Paint, and WordPad are all still installed by default. But they’re now listed under “Optional Features” in Windows 10 Settings, and there’s an uninstall button that lets you remove each app, although you will need to reboot your computer to complete the process.

While it’s handy to have applications for viewing and editing images and text pre-installed, there are a lot of much better free and paid apps for each function. So if you prefer NotePad++ to NotePad, for example, you can install that and remove Microsoft’s app rather than just changing your default app for opening TXT files.

You won’t save a lot of space though — Paint and WordPad only take up around 6 to 7MB of disk space each.

It’s possible that the change won’t be included in the next major version of Windows set to roll out in the coming months — Microsoft sometimes includes experimental features in preview builds but they aren’t always included in stable versions of Windows rolled out to non-beta testers. But Windows Latest notes that the apps are uninstallable in Windows Build 19041, which is rumored to be a release candidate for Windows 10 20H1.

via Bleeping Computer and Hexus

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4 replies on “Windows Notepad, WordPad, and Paint could become optional (and removable)”

  1. How bout getting rid of “install candy crush saga” and “install Minecraft”

    2. How about letting me get rid of edge?
      And the “parental controls”?
      And anything to do with Xbox?
      And not putting them back with updates?
      Work computers don’t need those things.

      1. I agree.
        There should be four types of Windows 10/11:
        – Work
        For workplaces, pro-features/heaviest OS, most expensive, no games or Apps.

        – Base
        For average personal laptop/desktop, heavy OS, very cheap, subsidised.

        – Education
        For students, free, ARM systems, light OS, no Win32 legacy support, no games, some Apps.

        – Enterprise
        For embedded and servers, lightest OS, windows framework, cheap, no games, Apps, or many features.

Comments are closed.