Small icons on the Windows 10 desktop. Increasing or decreasing the size of desktop shortcuts

The sizes of icons that are present on the desktop cannot always satisfy users. It all depends on the parameters of the monitor or laptop screen, as well as on individual preferences. Some people may find the icons too large, while others may find the icons too big. Therefore in all Windows versions It is possible to change their size yourself.

There are several ways to resize desktop shortcuts. Instructions on how to make desktop icons smaller in Windows 7 and latest versions This OS is almost identical. In Windows XP this task solved a little differently.

Method 1: Mouse Wheel

This is the easiest way to make desktop shortcuts larger or smaller. To do this, you need to hold down the key "Ctrl and at the same time start rotating the mouse wheel. When rotating away from you, there will be an increase, and when rotating towards you, there will be a decrease. All you have to do is achieve the size you want.

Getting acquainted with this method, many readers may ask: what about laptop owners who do not use a mouse? These users need to know how the mouse wheel is simulated on a touchpad. This is done with two fingers. Moving them from the center to the corners of the touchpad simulates forward rotation, and moving from the corners to the center simulates backward rotation.

Thus, in order to enlarge the icons, you need to hold down the key "Ctrl", and with the other hand on the touchpad make a movement from the corners to the center.

To make the icons smaller, move in the opposite direction.

Method 2: Context Menu

This method is as simple as the previous one. In order to achieve the desired goal, you need to right-click on the free space of the desktop to open context menu and go to the section "View".

Then all that remains is to select the desired icon size: regular, large, or small.


The disadvantages of this method include the fact that the user is offered only three fixed size icons, but for most this is more than enough.

Method 3: For Windows XP

You cannot increase or decrease the size of icons using the mouse wheel in Windows XP. To do this, you need to change the settings in the display properties. This is done in several steps.

Windows XP provides more flexible setup desktop icon sizes. To do this you need:

Now all you have to do is press the button "OK" and make sure that your desktop shortcuts are larger (or smaller, depending on your preference).

At this point, your acquaintance with ways to enlarge icons on your desktop can be considered complete. As you can see, even an inexperienced user can cope with this task.

Many people who use Windows operating systems often ask me how they can change the size of desktop shortcuts on a particular system. Users are asking for help quite outdated Windows XP, and users of the most common Windows 7 and relatively new Windows 8.

People are used to the standard size of shortcuts in Windows XP. After the usual icons, shortcuts in Windows 7 and 8 seem large. I can offer several solutions to this problem. Which one will be more convenient and which one to use is up to you.

How to resize xp shortcuts windows xp

Windows XP offers the user three sizes of shortcuts: large, regular and small. By default the system is regular size shortcuts. To make the icons larger or smaller, you must click right click mouse anywhere on your desktop. In the context menu that appears, select the “Properties” line and the window of the same name will open.

In the window " Additional design» Find the “Element” drop-down list. In this list, select “Icon” and to the right of it set the required size.

The default value is 32 - this is the standard size of Windows XP shortcuts. You can set any value of your own, or choose from the list offered by the system: 16, 32, 48 or 64. The size of shortcuts in Windows XP can only be selected from those preset by the system itself.

How to change the size of shortcuts in Windows 7

For Windows users 7 there are 2 more simple ways, change the size of icons in Windows 7 which I will describe below.

The first method starts the same way as in Windows XP. You right-click on your computer's desktop and open the familiar menu. Creators operating system Windows 7 has simplified this procedure a little.

In the menu that opens, hover your mouse over the “View” tab. You will see another menu in which you can choose from three standard icon sizes: large, normal and small. Also in this menu you can remove all your shortcuts from the desktop or, conversely, return them back by unchecking the box next to “Display desktop icons”.

The second way to change the size of shortcuts in Windows 7, which I myself most often use, is the easiest and fastest. While on your desktop, hold down one of the CTRL keys on your keyboard and roll your mouse wheel up or down. The desktop icons will begin to grow or shrink.

How to change the size of Windows 8 shortcuts

Windows 8, in addition to its “tiled” design, has a regular Windows desktop, like “seven”. Therefore, both methods I described above are also suitable for users to change the size of Windows 8 icons. You also right-click the menu on the desktop and select one of three standard shortcut sizes.

Or use a pressed CTRL key and mouse wheel. As you scroll the wheel up, the shortcuts will become larger. When scrolling down, on the contrary, it decreases. I consider this method the most effective of all the ones I have presented. Firstly, it allows you to accurately select suitable size shortcuts. Secondly, it will only take you 10 seconds and won’t force you to go to the menu and choose a size every time.

Many find it inconvenient to use personal computer at standard sizes desktop icons. Especially if it has been changed standard definition. In this case, the icons will have to be adjusted to fit parameters, namely to increase or decrease them. The problem is that not all users know how to do this.

It is worth noting that it is worth making icons larger when there are some health problems, namely vision. And in situations where the PC desktop is overloaded with an excessive number of shortcuts, on the contrary, it may be necessary to make fewer of them.

How to change icon size

If you need to change the size of your desktop icons, click on free space left mouse key. Then holding down the key Ctrl, twist wheel up. Icons thanks to your actions will increase. Conversely, by scrolling the mouse wheel down, you will achieve decrease icons

However, after such actions, the icons will most likely lose their usual location. When there is a small number of icons and folders, it is not difficult to return everything to its original place, but if we're talking about still about large number icons, you will have to spend more effort to restore them in an order convenient for you.

But the mouse wheel is not the only way enlarge icons. It is also possible to change via context menu. The order in which this will be done depends on your Windows operating system.

You can also tidy up your icons or remove them so that they do not appear on your desktop at all. turning off checkbox below.

Changing the size of icons in Windows XP

We have already looked at enlarging icons in Windows 7, but what action should you take if you have Windows XP installed? This option requires a different approach:

Can be changed. Surely most users have also heard that desktop icons can also change their size: they can be enlarged or made smaller if necessary. Moreover, some often encounter this directly: careless movement fingers on the touchpad on the laptop, and the shortcuts and font on the desktop suddenly grew sharply or became smaller. But it’s impossible to do everything back using the same mouse manipulations. It's time to put an end to this ignorance.

You can enlarge desktop shortcuts, their font and size in different ways. One of them, available on some laptop models running Windows 8 and 10, has already been tried unsuccessfully by users. Let's move on to others.

Using the same tool

A mouse, just not a built-in one, can still serve for good. Hold down the CTRL key and turn the wheel: the icons become smaller or, conversely, larger. This is easy to do, and the method does not require digging into various settings. Suitable for those who accidentally enlarged or reduced their desktop icons.

Context menu

A method for the lazy. Just right-click and select the View tab from the context menu to change the icons. True, there are only three options to choose from: small, medium, large. While using the wheel you could adjust the icons to the ideal size for you.

By the way, there are several more convenient functions here. The View tab allows you to quickly organize your icons so they don't end up scattered all over your desktop, and there are several sorting options to choose from. In addition, labels can be removed altogether (not deleted!) - then you won’t have to change their size. And at the same time you will greatly scare an inexperienced user.

Method for Windows 7

An excellent solution was applied for Windows 7, which greatly simplified the adjustment of desktop icons to the ideal look. Right-click on free space on the desktop and select the bottommost column - “Personalization”. In the window that opens, you can change the font of the icons, increase or decrease them, and also select another row custom settings to transform your desktop. Unfortunately, in Windows 10 we can change themes, wallpapers and something else through “Personalization,” but it’s very difficult to influence the icons there.

Windows 10

On Windows 10, no matter how hard you try, you won’t be able to increase or decrease the size of icons using the same settings. This can certainly be considered a minus new system. There is another special tab in the context menu that allows you to influence the shortcuts. It's called "Screen Settings". There you can move the slider to change shortcuts and everything else along with them on the desktop. In any case, the previous methods will work for Windows 10.

Text

The font, of course, also changes along with the shortcuts on the desktop, but, probably, many wanted to see completely different metamorphoses with it, or at least make the text smaller or larger, regardless of the shortcuts.

On Windows 7, you can do everything with fonts through the same personalization. On Windows 10, the font itself cannot be changed; you can only reduce/increase the size.

1. Open the “Designs and Personalization” window.
2. Select the “Screen” section.
3. In the “Change text size only” item, you can set bold for any selected text: window titles, icons, tooltips, etc. - and also change the font size.

As you can see, there are several methods to reduce or increase the size of labels, as well as their font. Choose the one that will allow you to make the necessary changes.

Ease of working in graphical Windows environment depends not only on the location of the controls, but also on their size. This also applies to desktop icons. Usually the system itself chooses what it thinks is the optimal icon size, but its choice is not always satisfactory to users. Some people have vision problems, some have the shortcuts themselves become smaller or larger, others simply like large controls. Enlarging desktop elements, by the way, makes practical sense on devices with touch screen, where a finger is used instead of a mouse cursor.

In the short tutorial below, we will walk you through how to change the size of desktop icons in Windows 7/10. For this you won't need third party programs, since the operating system itself allows you to get the desired result.

Via context menu

The simplest, fastest and most universal way to choose a comfortable size for desktop icons is to use its context menu. Let's use this method in equally to the seventh, eighth and tenth Windows versions. Right-click on the desktop and select the desired icon size in the “View” submenu. There are three templates in total – large, medium and small icons.

Using hot keys

Now let's see how to reduce or enlarge icons on the desktop using the keyboard, that is, hot keys. Hold Ctrl and scroll the manipulator roller up or down, depending on whether you want to make the icons larger or smaller. Like the previous one, this method is universal; in addition, it allows you to change the size of the labels over a wider range.

In Windows 7 Personalization Settings

Changing the icon size using this technique will not affect the text size in any way. To increase or decrease it, you will have to either (in Windows 10) or manually set the pixels in the personalization settings. Windows 7 provides the most opportunities in this regard, because in the settings appearance“seven” you can change not only the size of the text, but also the labels themselves.

How to enlarge icons on the Windows 7 desktop using this method? Very simple. Having called up the personalization settings through the desktop context menu, go to additional options design and select the element to be changed at the bottom of the window that opens, in in this case icon or font. Then, in the drop-down list on the right, select the appropriate size for it in pixels and save the settings.

Screen scaling

"Eight" offers a little less settings. To change the size of desktop icons, you will have to change the scale of all elements in the settings of the Display control panel applet, and then only up. On the other hand, you can set the text size of the icons − additional measure when changing the size of icons in the manner described at the beginning of the article.

Windows 10 doesn't have this either, except for the first one. universal method The tenth version of the system only offers upward scaling. By setting the scale to, say, 150 percent, you will increase the size of all interface elements, not just shortcuts on the desktop. To make Windows 10 desktop icons smaller, use the first method.

But you can easily reduce the icons on the taskbar, which is also part of the desktop. To do this, you need to open its properties and set the “Use small taskbar buttons” selector to the “On” position. This function is also supported in Windows 8.1; to implement it, you just need to go to the taskbar properties and check the “Use small buttons...” checkbox.

Afterword

As you can see, making desktop icons smaller or larger in Windows 7/10 is not difficult. One thing to remember, however, is that the quality of scalable icons depends entirely on the icon's enlargement - if it is small, the enlarged icon will look fuzzy. With the taskbar, things are a little more complicated. Using the system's tools, you can only reduce the icons attached to it, but to increase them beyond the sizes provided by the system, you will probably need third-party tweaker utilities.