Get Windows 7 Iconized (Icon Only) Taskbar Feature in Windows XP and Vista

Windows 7 taskbar doesn't show text in application buttons, it only show their icons. On the other hand previous Windows versions used to show icon as well as text in all application's taskbar buttons.

Actually Windows 7 new iconized taskbar feature looks good and it also saves space in taskbar area. If you want to have the same feature in Windows XP, Vista, Server 2003, 2008, etc, then you can get it after following a few simple and easy steps.

Before applying this tutorial:

After applying this tutorial:

So here are the steps to follow:

1. Type regedit in RUN dialog box and press Enter. It'll open Registry Editor. Now go to following key:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop\WindowMetrics

2. In right-side pane, create a new String value MinWidth and set its value to -255

3. That's it. Log off or restart your system and get ready to have iconized taskbar in your system.

4. To restore default taskbar behavior, delete the MinWidth String value and log off or restart your system.

PS: If you want a ready-made registry script which can do the task automatically, then download following ZIP file, extract it and then run the Install.reg file. It'll ask for confirmation, accept it:

Download Registry Script

This article was posted in Windows Vista, Windows XP.

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106 Comments

VG

^^ You'll need to create it manually or use the automatic registry script attached at last.

@Kai
Done. Now the ZIP file contains both install and uninstall scripts.
lifehacker

its quiet cool but it is a bug. it also decreases the lenght of mincaption. only close button appears, max and min button disappeared from mincaption.
muse

Hi VG! I want to ask you one thing. Is it possible to have only the text, without icon?
VG

^^ Sorry but its not possible.
Louis

Sorry to contradict here, but I think it is possible in XP. I changed MinWidth to 0 in XP and at least with the WindowBlinds theme (though possibly without), no text appears, just a nice icon. =)
Dave

Louis is right, it is possible with WindowBlinds to have just the icon showing without that one letter showing. However, it depends on the WB theme settings. It works correctly with the 7 theme from fediaFedia, showing only the icon and not the first letter at all. But with Butch123's recent Seven theme for XP WB, the theme looks amazing and closest to 7 so far but this theme does show the first letter.

So I've been trying to mess around with all of the font size settings within the WB theme but no luck so far. But this goes to show that there is hope, and hopefully Butch123 will figure out how fediaFedia's theme does this for Seven look. If somebody here has a DeviantArt account, please message Butch123 (I don't have an account) and let him know that it is possible to not show that first letter on XP and that his theme is the best so far, if it weren't for that one letter.
Dan

This tip isn't working for me... if it is getting overridden by the theme, what would I change in the theme to fix it? I can ResHack it to change the text resources in the theme where I assume the problem lies... but from what I can see both the theme.ini resource and the specific font/style combo ini file don't have any settings that look like they apply.
zak4994

Hey Vishal!
I have this problem where the button(s) group them selves up.
e.g. Firefox browser window and the firefox downloads window.
Anyway to solve this?
VG

^^ Its a known issue. Nothing can be done for it.
Andre

awesome theme VG!

@zak4994
try to uncheck 'group similar taskbar buttons' in taskbar and start menu properties
hope this help..