Microsoft Edge has long prided itself on providing a streamlined, modern browsing experience for Windows users, pairing its Chromium underpinnings with a distinctly Microsoft aesthetic. Yet, as Edge continues to mature and expand its feature set, a subtle but telling shift has emerged: the once-sleek “Settings and more” menu now stretches beyond the confines of a single screen for many users, especially on laptops and smaller displays. This seemingly minor UI development offers a window into larger questions around feature creep, user experience, and Microsoft’s ongoing challenges with design consistency across its ecosystem.
Since its inception as a replacement for the maligned Internet Explorer, Microsoft Edge has been continually updated with new features aimed at distinguishing it not just from its predecessor, but from competitors like Chrome and Firefox. The Edge of 2025 is a far cry from its clean, minimalist roots.
The tipping point for the cluttered menu, according to both end users and reporting from Windows Central, appears to have been the recent addition of a shortcut for creating tab groups. On paper, this feature fits naturally within Edge’s growing toolkit for managing web workflows. Yet its inclusion, while relatively minor, pushed Edge’s already-long “Settings and more” menu over a critical threshold: for many users, the menu now requires scrolling to access all available options—even on substantial displays, like a 16-inch workstation laptop.
This shift may seem trivial, but it represents the culmination of many incremental additions. Over time, each new tool or integrated service—such as Collections, Web Capture, and the various “more tools”—has expanded the length of the dropdown menu. Users now find themselves scrolling past a litany of items simply to access core browser functions, such as Settings or Help and Feedback.
Images shared on Reddit by user "JiroBibi" and further coverage by Windows Central illustrate this newfound need to scroll—a basic yet telling user experience issue. In the world of software UI, having to scroll within a single dropdown menu is often a warning sign: the product’s feature list has began to outpace the careful curation once associated with good design.
Feature creep occurs when a product, over time, accumulates new capabilities at a rate that ultimately undermines its original simplicity, diluting the clarity of its user experience. For Edge, this has manifested both in the lengthening menu and the sometimes bewildering array of options, many of which go unused by the majority of users.
What’s notably absent, as highlighted by both journalists and users on forums, is a straightforward way for individuals to customize this menu. While power users might appreciate the various tools available, casual users may wish to streamline their environment and hide lesser-used features. Calls for customizable menus—or at least an option to rearrange or hide menu items—have grown, particularly as the necessity to scroll grows more prominent.
By comparison, other browsers have begun to address this very pain point. Chrome, for example, has evolved its user interface to allow for greater customization of both its toolbar and context menus, with plugins and built-in toggles giving users more agency. Firefox, too, lets users refine which features occupy precious interface real estate, aiming to keep things focused and relevant to each workflow.
For Microsoft Edge, the lesson is clear: enhancing user control over interface clutter isn’t simply a “nice-to-have”—it’s increasingly essential for maintaining a modern, accessible browser experience. Allowing users to prune, reorder, or even disable certain menu entries could go a long way towards preserving Edge’s original promise of a clean, intuitive design.
As Windows Central and other commentators note, context menus in Windows OS provide a prime example of this tension. UI elements with varying degrees of rounded corners, different icon styles, and inconsistent typography co-exist within the same operating system. This, in large part, is a byproduct of Microsoft’s commitment to backward compatibility—a strength that paradoxically makes visual and functional consistency more difficult to achieve.
Recent user discussions, backed by images from Windows Insider builds, reveal experimental context menu designs with exaggerated rounded corners. While these rounder menus were ultimately walked back prior to shipping, their brief appearance serves as a reminder that UI coherence remains a moving target at Microsoft.
Yet progress is undeniable. Over the past decade, Microsoft has steadily nudged its core apps and system elements toward a shared design language informed by Fluent Design. Edge, too, has mostly kept pace with these shifts, boasting a contemporary, soft-edged aesthetic with fluid transitions and subtle shadows.
Still, many users would welcome not just more polish, but greater agency—especially where crowded menus and overlapping legacy elements are concerned. As one commentator wryly observed, cleaning up a digital interface involves trade-offs and complexity far beyond simply drawing a mockup.
To its credit, Microsoft has acknowledged the pain points associated with inconsistent menus and settings locations. The ongoing rollout of context menu updates in Windows 11, and backend improvements to harmonize system dialogs and notification banners, reflect a genuine effort to modernize the user experience. Even so, the work is far from finished.
Those who have followed Microsoft’s design journey over the past decade recognize the pattern: cycles of innovation, user feedback, and course correction. Earlier missteps—like the uneven application of Metro principles in Windows 8, or the initial confusion around the Windows 11 taskbar—have prompted more user-centric design thinking in recent years.
The issue now facing products like Edge is less about the specifics of any one feature, and more about the challenge of long-term stewardship. As menus expand and product scope widens, the risk of losing sight of the average user’s needs grows. Allowing users more granular control over UI clutter is just one way to keep the product grounded in its core mission.
So far, Edge remains one of the most attractive and capable browsers available, with forward momentum on both innovation and aesthetics. Yet, the current menu sprawl is an unmistakable early warning sign—a prompt for the Edge team to listen carefully to user feedback and act decisively to shore up what made the browser special in the first place.
By taking bold steps towards enhanced customization and renewed focus on the needs of everyday users, Microsoft Edge can remain not just a feature-rich tool, but one that genuinely delights and empowers all who rely on it. As the Windows ecosystem continues to evolve, only time will tell whether this balance can be maintained, or whether Edge will succumb to the very legacy clutter its design set out to transcend.
Source: Windows Central Microsoft Edge's settings menu is now so big it can't fit on a single screen
The Evolving Edge Menu: From Minimalism to Maximalism
Since its inception as a replacement for the maligned Internet Explorer, Microsoft Edge has been continually updated with new features aimed at distinguishing it not just from its predecessor, but from competitors like Chrome and Firefox. The Edge of 2025 is a far cry from its clean, minimalist roots.The tipping point for the cluttered menu, according to both end users and reporting from Windows Central, appears to have been the recent addition of a shortcut for creating tab groups. On paper, this feature fits naturally within Edge’s growing toolkit for managing web workflows. Yet its inclusion, while relatively minor, pushed Edge’s already-long “Settings and more” menu over a critical threshold: for many users, the menu now requires scrolling to access all available options—even on substantial displays, like a 16-inch workstation laptop.
This shift may seem trivial, but it represents the culmination of many incremental additions. Over time, each new tool or integrated service—such as Collections, Web Capture, and the various “more tools”—has expanded the length of the dropdown menu. Users now find themselves scrolling past a litany of items simply to access core browser functions, such as Settings or Help and Feedback.
Images shared on Reddit by user "JiroBibi" and further coverage by Windows Central illustrate this newfound need to scroll—a basic yet telling user experience issue. In the world of software UI, having to scroll within a single dropdown menu is often a warning sign: the product’s feature list has began to outpace the careful curation once associated with good design.
Feature Creep and User Control: The Case for Customization
To be fair, not all users view the need to scroll as a critical failing. Scrolling is a low-friction action, and modern touchpads and mice make it more seamless than ever. However, the underlying issue is less about the physical inconvenience and more about a growing perception that Edge—like so many mature products—may be inching towards feature creep.Feature creep occurs when a product, over time, accumulates new capabilities at a rate that ultimately undermines its original simplicity, diluting the clarity of its user experience. For Edge, this has manifested both in the lengthening menu and the sometimes bewildering array of options, many of which go unused by the majority of users.
What’s notably absent, as highlighted by both journalists and users on forums, is a straightforward way for individuals to customize this menu. While power users might appreciate the various tools available, casual users may wish to streamline their environment and hide lesser-used features. Calls for customizable menus—or at least an option to rearrange or hide menu items—have grown, particularly as the necessity to scroll grows more prominent.
By comparison, other browsers have begun to address this very pain point. Chrome, for example, has evolved its user interface to allow for greater customization of both its toolbar and context menus, with plugins and built-in toggles giving users more agency. Firefox, too, lets users refine which features occupy precious interface real estate, aiming to keep things focused and relevant to each workflow.
For Microsoft Edge, the lesson is clear: enhancing user control over interface clutter isn’t simply a “nice-to-have”—it’s increasingly essential for maintaining a modern, accessible browser experience. Allowing users to prune, reorder, or even disable certain menu entries could go a long way towards preserving Edge’s original promise of a clean, intuitive design.
Microsoft’s Consistency Challenge: Decades of Design, Decades of Legacy
The sprawl in Edge’s menu is hardly an isolated incident within Microsoft’s software universe. For years, the company has struggled with UI consistency across its sprawling product landscape. While the company has made significant strides since the fragmented days of Windows 8 and the abrupt shift to Metro design, vestiges of legacy interfaces persist in even the latest versions of Windows 11 and its associated apps.As Windows Central and other commentators note, context menus in Windows OS provide a prime example of this tension. UI elements with varying degrees of rounded corners, different icon styles, and inconsistent typography co-exist within the same operating system. This, in large part, is a byproduct of Microsoft’s commitment to backward compatibility—a strength that paradoxically makes visual and functional consistency more difficult to achieve.
Recent user discussions, backed by images from Windows Insider builds, reveal experimental context menu designs with exaggerated rounded corners. While these rounder menus were ultimately walked back prior to shipping, their brief appearance serves as a reminder that UI coherence remains a moving target at Microsoft.
Yet progress is undeniable. Over the past decade, Microsoft has steadily nudged its core apps and system elements toward a shared design language informed by Fluent Design. Edge, too, has mostly kept pace with these shifts, boasting a contemporary, soft-edged aesthetic with fluid transitions and subtle shadows.
Still, many users would welcome not just more polish, but greater agency—especially where crowded menus and overlapping legacy elements are concerned. As one commentator wryly observed, cleaning up a digital interface involves trade-offs and complexity far beyond simply drawing a mockup.
Critical Analysis: Balancing Power With Usability
To fairly assess the current state of Microsoft Edge’s interface, it’s important to recognize both notable achievements and emerging risks.Strengths
- Feature-Rich Environment: Edge has rapidly become one of the most feature-packed browsers on the market, with tools that genuinely boost productivity for power users. The ability to group tabs, capture web snippets, integrate with Office, and access a robust extension ecosystem puts it on par with—and in some cases, ahead of—longstanding competitors like Chrome and Firefox.
- Modern Aesthetic: Thanks to persistent investment in Fluent Design, Edge mostly feels coherent, fresh, and pleasant to use. System-level animations, light/dark mode support, and thoughtful typography choices contribute to an experience that compares favorably to even Apple's Safari.
- Innovation Pace: The frequency of updates and responsiveness to user feedback (via Insider channels and public forums) suggests an agile development culture. Microsoft isn’t afraid to test experimental features, then refine or pull them back based on telemetry and feedback.
Potential Risks
- Feature Bloat: With each new release, the risk that Edge’s user interface becomes overwhelming increases. The proliferation of menu entries—many of which may be irrelevant to large swathes of the user base—undermines the goal of a clean, efficient browser.
- Reduced Discoverability: As options proliferate, it becomes harder for users to find the tools they actually need. When simple actions—like accessing Settings—require scrolling past a long list of infrequently used options, usability takes a hit.
- Inconsistent Customization: Unlike some of its rivals, Edge currently offers limited built-in options to customize the main menu or hide unused features. This limitation is especially acute for users who value a distraction-free interface but are now forced to engage with a menu that has outgrown their screens.
- Design Drift: While the core design language remains strong, experimental UI elements and legacy holdovers occasionally disrupt the overall consistency. This is exacerbated by Microsoft’s need to cater to enterprise users and guarantee compatibility across decades of Windows development.
The Bigger Picture: UI Consistency Across Microsoft’s Ecosystem
Edge’s ever-expanding menu is symptomatic of a wider challenge facing Microsoft: how to balance rapid innovation and broad compatibility with a commitment to design consistency and usability. With Windows supporting an unparalleled array of legacy software and user workflows, tidying up the interface is a task that requires both thoughtful planning and a willingness to make difficult trade-offs.To its credit, Microsoft has acknowledged the pain points associated with inconsistent menus and settings locations. The ongoing rollout of context menu updates in Windows 11, and backend improvements to harmonize system dialogs and notification banners, reflect a genuine effort to modernize the user experience. Even so, the work is far from finished.
Those who have followed Microsoft’s design journey over the past decade recognize the pattern: cycles of innovation, user feedback, and course correction. Earlier missteps—like the uneven application of Metro principles in Windows 8, or the initial confusion around the Windows 11 taskbar—have prompted more user-centric design thinking in recent years.
The issue now facing products like Edge is less about the specifics of any one feature, and more about the challenge of long-term stewardship. As menus expand and product scope widens, the risk of losing sight of the average user’s needs grows. Allowing users more granular control over UI clutter is just one way to keep the product grounded in its core mission.
Solutions and the Path Forward
So what can Microsoft do to address concerns around Edge’s ballooning menu—and more broadly, design consistency across its platform?Short Term: Usability Improvements
- Menu Customization: Implement user-friendly options to allow menu rearrangement, hiding, or collapsing of infrequently accessed features. Drawing inspiration from products like Chrome and Firefox, Microsoft could empower users to tailor their menus for speed and clarity.
- Context-Aware Tools: Use AI or telemetry to prioritize frequently used tools, surfacing them at the top of the menu while pushing rarely-used features down or into secondary submenus.
- Accessibility Enhancements: Ensure that all menu items are easily reachable with a keyboard, and that scrolling doesn’t interfere with screen readers or touch inputs—a crucial step for making Edge accessible to every user.
Longer Term: Strategic Design Alignment
- Unified Design Language: Continue evolving Fluent Design to cover every corner of Windows and its mainline apps, smoothing over rough edges and eliminating visual inconsistencies wherever practical.
- User Feedback Loops: Double down on transparent, two-way communication with Edge users. Expand avenues for feedback and give users real insight into how their suggestions are prioritized and implemented.
- Legacy Support With Discipline: Be judicious about how legacy features and enterprise requirements are surfaced in core UI. Where feasible, legacy tools could be tucked away or accessed through “advanced” settings rather than crowding the top-level experience.
Conclusion: The Road to a Better Edge
The growing girth of Microsoft Edge’s settings and tools menu is, on the surface, a minor inconvenience. But at a deeper level, it represents a crossroads for the browser—and for Microsoft as a whole. Will the drive for ever-more features overwhelm the original vision of simplicity? Or will Microsoft seize the opportunity to reassert its commitment to usability, customization, and design coherence?So far, Edge remains one of the most attractive and capable browsers available, with forward momentum on both innovation and aesthetics. Yet, the current menu sprawl is an unmistakable early warning sign—a prompt for the Edge team to listen carefully to user feedback and act decisively to shore up what made the browser special in the first place.
By taking bold steps towards enhanced customization and renewed focus on the needs of everyday users, Microsoft Edge can remain not just a feature-rich tool, but one that genuinely delights and empowers all who rely on it. As the Windows ecosystem continues to evolve, only time will tell whether this balance can be maintained, or whether Edge will succumb to the very legacy clutter its design set out to transcend.
Source: Windows Central Microsoft Edge's settings menu is now so big it can't fit on a single screen
