How to enable Taskbar drag and drop on Windows 11

On Windows 11, to simplify the Taskbar experience, Microsoft ended up removing some useful features, including the ability to drag and drop files to open with a running application.

Although the company may still bring back the support, in the meantime, a small tool has emerged in GitHub that allows you to drag and drop files to mimic the same missing functionality to open the file with the running application.

In this guide, you will learn the steps to bring back the drag and drop support for the Taskbar on Windows 11.

Enable drag and drop in Taskbar

To enable the drag and drop feature in the Taskbar, use these steps:

1. Open GitHub repo page.

2. Click the Windows11DragAndDropToTaskbarFix.exe download link and save the file on your computer.

   

3. Right-click the file and select the Run as administrator option.

4. Click the Yes button.

Once you complete the steps, you can drag a file to the app button and drop it over the running application (window) to open it.

When using this tool, it’s worth noting that the “not allowed” icon will still show up when dragging the file to the running application.

Optional configuration

To allow the tool to run automatically at startup and hide the console window, use these steps:

1. Open File Explorer.

2. Navigate the path to the application folder location.

3. Click the New menu and select the Text Document folder option.

   

4. Name the folder Windows11DragAndDropToTaskbarFixConfig.txt and press Enter.

5. Double-click the text file to open it with Notepad.

6. Copy and paste the following command to allow the tool to run at startup: 

   AutomaticallyRunThisProgramOnStartup=1

   

7. Copy and paste the following command to hide the console window:

   ShowConsoleWindowOnStartup=1

8. Click the File menu and select the Save option.

After you complete the steps, the tool will run automatically without additional steps.