How do I disable split screen for opening links?

Anonymous
2013-10-21T19:00:24+00:00

I am running Win 8.1 on a TABLET.  I have about 9 inches of screen real estate to work with.

If I click a link in, say, the Mail app, it will launch IE in 50/50 mode with the existing mail app (which then rearranges itself to only show the single message I was looking at).

This is not at all helpful.  This gives me a four inch web browser, which isn't big enough to see clearly at all.  The controls are all too close together to operate by touch, etc.  I am then forced to manually drag to expand the IE window to full screen.  Unfortunately, the control to do this is also rather small, and I usually miss the first two times.  It typically takes me about 10-15 seconds between clicking a link in email and being able to read the corresponding web page.

Windows 8 handled this correctly.  I would like to revert to the behavior of always opening apps in full screen mode.  How can I accomplish this?

I know it should be possible.  If I hold the tablet in portrait mode, the annoying split window thing does not happen.  (It's not natural for me to hold it this way all the time.)

Is there a registry setting or something for "Always open new apps in full screen mode"?

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Accessibility

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  1. Anonymous
    2016-07-08T23:53:48+00:00

    Unfortunately, turning off Snap View may work in Desktop Mode, but it does nothing in Tablet Mode, and that's true even in Windows 10.  I've upgraded to Windows 10 and have Snap completely turned off, but in Tablet Mode, it still insists on opening Mail links in split screen.  Any solution that involves running in Desktop Mode is more than useless on a tablet.

    I gave my old Windows 10 tablet to my wife who has come from an Android tablet, and she told me she loves the tablet and is generally happy with Windows 10, except she hates that Mail links open up split-screen and she asked how to make them open full screen.  I had to tell her, "You can't.  This is something people have been complaining about since Windows 8.1".

    How can this complaint be escalated to someone who can actually do something about it?

    I think we may have a bug here then, because it did work in tablet mode for me but now its not... at first it would like go to snap then pop into fullscreen, now it doesn't :/

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  2. Anonymous
    2016-07-09T00:23:24+00:00

    But it does open mail link in Edge fullscreen with the tablet in portrait mode, but not in landscape.

    With another browser as default it switch to desktop and open fullscreen when in tablet mode even in landscape.

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  3. Anonymous
    2017-08-24T12:57:05+00:00

    If you make Chrome your default browser then this annoying behavior goes away.

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  4. Anonymous
    2017-12-10T05:57:24+00:00

    Completely agree. Equally annoying to force it on users.

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