The App Launching Penalty
You are working on a spreadsheet and you suddenly want to know if it is going to rain this afternoon. You want to check the current price of a specific stock, and you want to see if your 2:00 PM meeting was cancelled.
To find this information, you have to break your concentration. You open a web browser, type in a weather website, wait for the ads to load, and read the forecast. Then you open a new tab, search for the stock ticker, and check the price. Finally, you open the Outlook application, wait for it to sync, and check your calendar. You just spent three minutes opening three separate applications to find three tiny pieces of information, completely derailing your focus on the spreadsheet.
To solve this, Microsoft built a dedicated dashboard into Windows 11 called the Widgets Board. Instead of launching heavy applications, the Widgets Board is a hidden panel that slides out from the edge of your screen, presenting you with a highly customizable, at-a-glance view of your calendar, the weather, your to-do list, and live news feeds, all in one place.
Accessing the Widgets Board
The Widgets Board is always running in the background, waiting for you to call it up.
- Look at the very far left side of your taskbar (the bar at the bottom of your screen). You will see an icon that usually displays the current temperature and a small weather icon (like a sun or a cloud).
- Hover your mouse over that weather icon (or click it).
- The Widgets Board will instantly slide out from the left edge of your screen, covering the left half of your desktop.
Alternatively, if you prefer keyboard shortcuts, simply press the Windows Key + W.
Customizing Your Dashboard
By default, the Widgets Board is often cluttered with news stories and celebrity gossip that you might not care about. You need to customize it to show only the tools you actually use.
- Open the Widgets Board.
- Click the Plus (+) icon in the top right corner of the board to open the widget gallery.
- You will see a list of available widgets, including Outlook Calendar, To Do, Traffic, Sports, and Stocks. Click the Pin button next to the ones you want.
- To remove a widget you do not want (like the Entertainment feed), click the three-dot menu icon in the top right corner of that specific widget and select Unpin widget.
Arranging and Resizing
Once you have pinned your favorite tools, you can arrange them to create a perfect layout.
- Moving: Click and hold the top bar of any widget and physically drag it to a new position on the board. You can put your Calendar at the very top left for immediate visibility.
- Resizing: Click the three-dot menu on a widget and select Small, Medium, or Large. Making the Calendar widget large allows you to see your entire agenda for the day, while keeping the Weather widget small saves space.
The News Feed
Below your pinned widgets, Windows displays an infinite scrolling feed of news articles powered by Microsoft Start. If you find this distracting, you can click the Settings gear icon in the top right corner of the Widgets Board and customize the news topics to only show professional industry news, or turn the feed off entirely in the newest versions of Windows 11.
Stop wasting time opening full applications just to check the weather or your next meeting. By customizing the Windows 11 Widgets Board, you can build a personalized, slide-out dashboard that delivers critical information at a glance without breaking your workflow.