How To Force Quit Programs On Windows – SlashGear

The Alt + F4 keyboard shortcut has long been the easiest way to quit a program on Windows, but Microsoft is giving its customers another option, starting with Windows 11 Preview Build 23466. In this version, Windows 11 has a shortcut in the taskbar that, when clicked, will open a menu with a very convenient option: “Force Quit.” 

Rather than just telling Windows to quit the program, this option tells it to fully end the task. That means it’ll be able to shut down frozen apps that don’t respond to the Alt + F4 shortcut. To use the feature, you need to:

1. Right-click on the frozen app’s icon in the taskbar.
2. Select “Force Quit” in the menu that appears.

This feature is still in beta, and is only available to some Windows Insider beta users. Early versions of the feature have featured the wording “End Task” in the menu rather than “Force Quit,” though it’s hard to say which wording will be used in the final version of the feature for Windows 11. Windows users must manually enable the feature for it to appear in the right-click menu:

1. Click the Windows icon in the taskbar.
2. Click the gear icon to open Settings.
3. Select “System.”
4. Select the “For Developers” option.
5. Toggle on the switch next to the menu card titled “End Task.”

Though this feature has to be manually turned on at the time of writing, it is possible that it’ll be enabled by default when the final update rolls out.