Windows 11--most recently opened Explorer window keeps popping up into the foreground

Anonymous
2023-01-01T17:15:47+00:00

About a month ago Windows Explorer started the annoying habit of routinely moving its most recently opened window into the foreground. Is there a way to stop it from doing this?

For example, I'll open an Explorer window to open a file into another application, and a few minutes later, for no apparent reason, Windows Explorer will interrupt the application by popping its Explorer window into the foreground. The same thing will happen when watching a video: a minute or two into watching the video and the most recently opened Explorer window will move into the foreground interrupting the video.

The only way to stop this behavior is to close all Explorer windows while watching a video or working in another application. Annoying as heck. Any suggestions? Thanks.

Microsoft Windows 11 Home Version 10.0.22621 Build 22621

Windows for home | Windows 11 | Files, folders, and storage

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

0 comments

575 answers

Sort by: Oldest
Most helpful Newest Oldest
  1. Anonymous
    2023-08-16T06:26:57+00:00

    The past couple of days this issue has not occurred for me. It used to constantly.

    Device name Dell-2023-AIO

    Processor 13th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-1355U 1.70 GHz

    Installed RAM 16.0 GB (15.7 GB usable)

    Device ID 131CE122-0106-42F5-BD91-40E457B32AD0

    Product ID 00342-22176-95797-AAOEM

    System type 64-bit operating system, x64-based processor

    Pen and touch Touch support with 10 touch points

    Edition Windows 11 Home

    Version 22H2

    Installed on ‎7/‎22/‎2023

    OS build 22621.2134

    Experience Windows Feature Experience Pack 1000.22659.1000.0

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  2. Anonymous
    2023-08-16T07:58:17+00:00

    The past couple of days this issue has not occurred for me. It used to constantly.

    If you have window explorer windows newly/recently opened in the background, and then if you do --

    gpupdate /force

    -- then do the explorer windows pop up?

    Just today - the pop-ups happened on my laptop, and also happened on a desktop - with lots of people in the room seeing it occur, as it was during a presentation. The explorer window popped up. Those same people saw it before, a couple of weeks ago.

    The most precarious thing is when somebody might be just doing some word editing - and start pushing some combination of key - eg. delete/backspace, or whatever. And if the explorer window just so happens to popup, then it is not always easy to tell if a particular key combination (whatever that may be) may delete something, or just something unforeseen - negative unforeseen impact that is.

    This is the reason that MS needs to get on the case. But nobody seems to know if anybody is actually on the case.

    Was this answer helpful?

    1 person found this answer helpful.
    0 comments
  3. Anonymous
    2023-08-17T19:33:42+00:00

    It happens to me all the time. very randomly after hours. I notice this, because I'm developing for hours and all of a sudden the explorer appears in the foreground.

    very recently (just minutes before this post). so I was checking the event logs.

    at that time there were only logs about

    System > Aggregated Threat assessment of current system instance (EnhancedPhishingProtection-Events Service)

    Was this answer helpful?

    1 person found this answer helpful.
    0 comments
  4. Anonymous
    2023-08-17T20:01:00+00:00

    Here's a question. Is there any way to safely suppress the gpupdate function that's apparently causing this until MS fixes the problem? I so rarely make changes to the group policies that I think I could live if it's not forcing updates multiple times per day.

    The "Group Policy Client" service seems like a juicy suspect. I'm too chicken to try it myself.

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  5. Anonymous
    2023-08-17T20:21:52+00:00

    once again today, no issues - it no longer pops up .. this is true on my older Win12 machine as well

    (I did nothing to change this from last week when it was an issue, and there has not been any Windows update since then either ... beats me)

    Was this answer helpful?

    1 person found this answer helpful.
    0 comments