Windows 11 Desktop icons rearrange and re-sort themselves

Anonymous
2023-07-21T01:09:08+00:00

Lately, my Windows desktop icons have periodically and at random rearranged and re-sorted themselves.

It looks like at arbitrary times, This PC and the Recycle Bin, which are traditionally at the top left hand corner of the desktop now shift downwards. The icons re-sort themselves into alphabetical name order. It usually happens after a boot or reboot.

I also have icons spread out randomly over a two-screen desktop. At an arbitrary moment, again associated with a reboot, all icons suddenly snap to the left hand side of the left-hand screen.

There are many posts on the web about the "Autoarrange Icons" and "Align Icons" settings. Changing those settings do not resolve this problem.

This may have something with the ""Sort By" setting. If that is it, the setting does not stay that way for long.

I don't know if this is a new bug that has appeared in a recent build. I use Windows 11 Home, and the current Version is 22H2, and the Build is 22621.1992.

Windows for home | Windows 11 | Settings

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  1. Anonymous
    2024-01-18T15:57:36+00:00

    Good luck and have a nice day. Steve

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  2. Anonymous
    2024-01-18T15:32:56+00:00

    Well I've seen people recommend installing a program but that seems like an extreme measure to have to take. How is this not just a setting in Win11 or something simple? It didn't do it at first, until the most recent update, and while it did mess up again when I used the 4th monitor that wasn't the case for 2 of the 3 times it's done it (in 5 days).

    I also change out the icons on a daily basis. I have different versions of the same spreadsheet saved there for example as I am working on them, with different dates in the names. So even my desktop from 2 days ago was different than it is today by a handful of icons. If I had the same ones all the time and never changed them then maybe a program like you suggest would work, but I don't know that's the case for me.

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  3. Anonymous
    2024-01-18T15:21:37+00:00

    If all fails, you can download the ReICon v2.0 {Restore Desktop Icon Layout} by Sordum which can save your icon arrangement to its saved state thus avoiding the time resetting things up again. It is still a pain in the butt, but it will save you some time. Steve

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  4. Anonymous
    2024-01-18T14:45:03+00:00

    Am happy that you were able to solve your issue, but in my case I didn't install any new software. It just started to happen after Win11 did an update about a week ago. I manually adjusted all my desktop icons the next morning which was difficult because it would not let me put icons close together without auto-arranging them even though auto-arrange was turned off, as was align to grid. So I ended up having to raise all my icons up about a row, leaving an inch of blank real estate at the bottom. But that was the only way it would let me put them clustered together.

    The second time it happened I did use a TV as a 4th monitor, which made the resolution flicker. In the past (with Win10) it would flicker and mess up my desktop icons while the TV was on, but as soon as I turned it off they would rearrange back to their original positions. With Win11 they got messed up with the introduction of the 4th screen but never went back when the TV was turned off.

    Interestingly enough though, when I had to rearrange them the second time it did allow me to use the bottom inch of the desktop for icons without auto-arranging them (again, auto-arrange is off).

    Uninterestingly, it messed them up again this morning, for a third time. I had not used the 4th screen/TV and I had just put my computer to "sleep", not a full shut down or restart or anything. I have no idea why it messed them up this time, but I had to spend another 10 putting them all back again.

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  5. Anonymous
    2024-01-18T14:31:32+00:00

    I finally found and solved the problem with the rearranging icons. I got a Blink Outdoor 4 camera set for Christmas and the way to set it up required thru a cell phone app, which I did, and it worked fine but I wanted the systems also be setup on my computer. One way was to download the Bluestacks - App Player for Windows and setup the system via Google Play app, which I did, and it worked.

    When I restarted my computer the next day, the rearranging problem started to show up. The way I solved the problem, was to remove two of the three files created by Bluestacks leaving only the Bluestacks App Player and that solved the problem.

    Hope this info will also solve your problem, Steve.

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