Windows 11 cut the right click menu down to a short list and hid the rest behind Show more options. The video fixes it with a one click registry script called Classic Menu Switcher. This page explains exactly what that script changes, shows the same change done by hand, and shows the undo — because a fix you cannot reverse is not a fix.
Right click on a file in Windows 11 and you get a short, tidy menu — but the option you actually want, the one from 7-Zip, WinRAR or plain old Open with, sits one more click away behind Show more options. The video's answer is a small registry script the creator built himself, Classic Menu Switcher: download it, run it, and the full classic menu is back. Below is the complete honest picture — what the script does inside Windows, the identical change typed by hand, and how to undo everything in seconds.
The creator's tool is a small file named Classic Menu Switcher, and the video description is the only place he shares it. The whole job is:
No program stays installed afterwards. The file makes one registry change and its work is done.
So there is no mystery about your own PC: the script writes one small registry key under your own user account:
HKCU\Software\Classes\CLSID\{86ca1aa0-34aa-4e8b-a509-50c905bae2a2}\InprocServer32
Windows 11's new menu is drawn by a registered shell component with that long ID in braces. Placing an empty InprocServer32 key under your user's Classes branch masks that component for your account, so Explorer falls back to the classic menu code that is still built into Windows. Nothing is deleted, no system file is patched, and no other user account on the PC is affected.
If you prefer clicking to scripts, the manual route takes two minutes:
regedit, press EnterHKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Classes\CLSID{86ca1aa0-34aa-4e8b-a509-50c905bae2a2}InprocServer32InprocServer32, double click (Default) on the right, leave the value data completely empty, and click OKThat last detail matters: the value must exist as an empty string. Opening the dialog and pressing OK is what sets it — a value left as (value not set) may not do the job.
Prefer the keyboard? Open Command Prompt — a normal one, no administrator needed, because this key lives in your own user branch — paste this line and press Enter:
reg add "HKCU\Software\Classes\CLSID\{86ca1aa0-34aa-4e8b-a509-50c905bae2a2}\InprocServer32" /f /ve
The reply The operation completed successfully is your receipt. This command, the registry editor route and the script all produce exactly the same state; they are three doors into the same room.
Explorer draws the menu, and it read its settings when it started — so the menu will not change until Explorer restarts:
Restarting the PC does the same job if you prefer. Skipping this step is the number one reason people think the tweak did not work.
The tweak is fully reversible because it only added something. Delete the key and Windows forgets it ever existed:
reg delete "HKCU\Software\Classes\CLSID\{86ca1aa0-34aa-4e8b-a509-50c905bae2a2}" /f
Restart Explorer the same way as above and the compact Windows 11 menu is back, exactly as it was. Nothing else on the PC was touched in either direction.
The creator runs the Classic Menu Switcher live in the video — download it from the description there and watch the menu change on a real PC.
▶ Watch Full VideoThe change it makes is one small registry key under your own user account, and it is fully reversible with one delete command. Like any script, download it only from the video description, and if you want to be sure, open it in Notepad first - you should see the single CLSID key path and nothing else.
No. The key lives under HKEY_CURRENT_USER, your own part of the registry, so the command and the script work from a standard account. Windows may still show a confirmation box when a registry script merges - that is normal.
It stays until you remove it or a major Windows feature update resets it. Monthly updates normally leave it alone. If the short menu ever comes back on its own, run the script or the command again - it takes ten seconds.