[Windows 10 Bug] No Borders Showing around Program Windows
Here is an interesting and very annoying bug which I encountered recently while using Windows 10 operating system. This bug or issue is related to border display around various program windows in Windows 10.
For your reading and viewing pleasure, first I’ll share a few screenshots of some program windows in Windows 10 showing the bug live in action. You can easily notice that no borders are showing around program windows:
This PC or File Explorer window showing no borders in Windows 10:
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Settings window (UWP apps) showing no borders in Windows 10:
Mozilla Firefox (Other 3rd party software programs) window showing no borders in Windows 10:
You can see in above screenshots, no borders are showing around program windows which makes it very ugly looking and hard to see. In Windows Explorer window and 3rd party program windows, no border is showing anywhere such as top, bottom, left and right side. In Settings and other UWP apps, the border is showing on top side only.
The funny thing is that the borders don’t show in active windows only i.e. when we make the program window active by clicking on it. If a program window is inactive i.e. the focus is somewhere else, borders show fine in program windows. That’s the main bug.
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Following screenshots show borders are showing in inactive program windows:
This PC or File Explorer window showing borders in Inactive state in Windows 10:
Settings window (UWP apps) showing borders in Inactive state in Windows 10:
Mozilla Firefox (Other 3rd party software programs) window showing borders in Inactive state in Windows 10:
Why Windows 10 is showing borders in inactive windows and not in active windows?
Now you might want to know when this problem occurs and how to reproduce this border bug in Windows 10?
This bug is related to built-in Colorization feature and occurs if you uncheck or deselect “Show accent color on Title bars and window borders” option using “Settings -> Personalization -> Colors” page as shown in following screenshot:
You can see in above screenshot, when the option is disabled, borders get hidden automatically.
As soon as you enable the option again, the borders come back around program windows as shown in following screenshot:
Following screenshot shows borders are showing fine in File Explorer window when the option in Settings app is enabled:
The border issue can be noticed more clearly if you also disable “Show shadows under windows” option using classic system properties window as mentioned in following steps:
1. Press WIN+R keys together to launch RUN dialog box. Now type sysdm.cpl and press Enter. It’ll open classic System Properties window.
PS: You can add a permanent shortcut to classic System Properties in This PC context menu with the help of this tutorial.
2. Now go to Advanced tab and click on Settings button present under Performance section.
3. It’ll open another window. Now uncheck “Show shadows under windows” option under Visual Effects tab.
Apply the changes and shadows effect will be removed around window borders and you’ll clearly notice that no borders are showing around program windows.
In my opinion, either borders should display in both active and inactive windows or should not display in both states. It’s funny to see that the borders are invisible in active windows but become visible in inactive windows.
If I remember correctly, this bug was not present in older versions of Windows 10 as I always disable shadows and other visual effects to improve system performance and the border issue never appeared in Windows 10.
This border issue or bug seems new to me. Have you also encountered this issue in Windows 10? Feel free to share your opinion in comments section.
If you know about any other bug present in Windows 10 or other Windows versions, you can also share it.
Also Check:
Master Tutorial to Make Windows 10 Super Fast
Tweak Colorization Settings for Titlebar, Taskbar and Start Menu in Windows 10
“I always disable shadows and other visual effects to improve system performance” – serious? How old is your hardware? Over 15 year old?
^^ Many people like me don’t like eye candy effects such as useless and unnecessary animations, shadows and transparency effects.
^^Like me too
And my laptop is not 15 year old
i7 8750H 32 gb 2667 mhz 250Gb Nvme 2tb hdd uhd intel 630 gtx1050 4gb
This was first seen in version 1809. In version 1903 and later, normally if “Title bars and window borders” is toggled off, the window border is very thin black. The issue in the first 3 images can be reproduced by switching the Windows mode FROM dark to light. Ending dwm.exe reverts the window borders to black.
Microsoft forced 1 pixel UI borders on everyone with ZERO native easy-to-find options to increase it (like it was for 20 years prior). What is more astounding is the lack of end user outrage over hard-coding such a thing in a major operating system.