Windows 10 Start Menu can’t have multiple shortcuts with the same target

start-menuwindows 10

Problem

If you create two shortcuts with the same target then only one of them is displayed in the Start Menu. This is true for:

  • search results within the Start menu
  • manually browsing program folders within the Start menu
  • pinned shortcuts within the Start menu

This is important because:

  • the shortcuts might have different settings defined in the Properties dialog, such as different compatibility settings, or be set to start in different directories.
  • some programs install a shortcut to a command prompt which is set to open in the program's installation folder. This enables easy access to the program from the command line without having to modify %PATH%, but it means that users who are unaware of this "lose access" to CMD. Programs that do this:

Things I've tried

  • Renaming shortcuts
    • Only the shortcut that comes first alphabetically is displayed
  • Using folders doesn't help
    • Only the shortcut in the folder that comes first alphabetically is displayed
  • Pinning shortcuts doesn't help
    • the pinned shortcut updates to point to the displayed shortcut

Steps to reproduce

Fully up-to-date Windows 10 Home.

  1. Start → search for "Command Prompt" (or "cmd").
  2. (Optional) Right-click on Command Prompt → Pin to Start.
    • This makes Command Prompt available when you open the Start menu without searching for anything.
  3. Right-click on Command Prompt → Open file location
    • This opens a File Explorer window in %APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\System Tools
  4. Copy the Command Prompt shortcut and rename the copy "AAA Command Prompt"
    • This ensures it appears before Command Prompt when files are listed alphabetically.
  5. (Optional) Right-click on the new AAA Command Prompt shortcut → Properties
    • Change something. (E.g. set the "Start in" directory to a different location, such as C:\)

Notice that it is now not possible to access Command Prompt from the Start menu – it has been replaced with AAA Command Prompt everywhere. If you rename AAA Command Prompt to ZZZ Command Prompt then you get back the ordinary version and lose the customised version. Moving the shortcuts to different folders within %APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\ doesn't help.

Any ideas?

Best Answer

As of Win 10 (1903) Aug 2019, it seems that the Start Menu will now allow duplicate shortcuts to the same .exe as long as the arguments are different. For this to work though, the "duplicate" shortcuts needs to be created by any method OTHER THAN making a copy of the already existing shortcut in the Start Menu and modifying it.

So, a shortcut created with the target as

C:\Windows\system32\cmd.exe /K "cd C:\"

will open up the command prompt at C:\, and a shortcut created with the target as

C:\Windows\system32\cmd.exe /K "cd C:\Users\"

will open up the command prompt at C:\Users\. Both shortcuts will be shown on the Start Menu, in addition to the default Command Prompt shortcut, even if they have the same name.

I was also able to create a duplicate shortcut to cmd.exe that will show up in the Start Menu and function identically by using ' as an argument. Target:

C:\Windows\system32\cmd.exe '

Which I can then modify to launch cmd with different properties (admin/compatability etc.). This may not be suitable for other executables.

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