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Does Windows 8 have a multiple desktop facility like in Linux systems (Fedora, Ubuntu, Opensolaris etc)?

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closed as too broad by slhck Apr 29 at 19:25


+1 - ever find a more comprehensive list or a particularly recommended app? I'm especially interested in one that plays well with windows 8 metro mode –  George Mauer Jan 20 '13 at 19:17
Windows' "side-by-side" feature could manage this, but unfortunately you're not able to launch two "Desktop" Apps... Cool stuff done wrong. yahoo.com/tech/… –  kernel Jul 25 at 13:47
Seems pretty rough that this was closed. It's a straightforward question that's not broad at all: does windows 8 have feature X? Answer: no. The fact answerers might want to elaborate on other solutions isn't a problem caused by the question being broad. –  Rory Sep 2 at 18:41
Can I just say that it seems flawed to close questions such as these for being 'too broad' when the question has alot of upvotes and there seems to be, in general, a lot of people that are deriving benefit from it. –  Peter Scott Sep 17 at 11:58

3 Answers 3

up vote 29 down vote accepted

Besides adding additional monitors, there is no such feature in Windows.

There are third-party solutions to create virtual desktops.

The folks at Sysinternals have made Desktops v2.0: Desktops Options
Desktops v2.0 settings

Desktops peek
Tray icon peek feature

For more applications, see this list.

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Nice. Unfortunately, not every application likes this. For example Chrome does not show any error when trying to start it again on another desktop, while Firefox will show "Firefox is already running, but is not responding. To open a new window, you must first close the existing Firefox process, or restart your system." But one can easily give it a test run, as it doesn't require any installation. Just unzip and run. –  Arjan Dec 16 '13 at 8:19
Can you move one application from one desktop to another without starting it anew in the new desktop? –  jmbejara Jan 13 at 22:00
21 upvotes? This makes me wonder if I'm the only one who finds this tool useless because the Windows key brings you back to desktop number 1. I use the windows key to launch programs via keyboard. –  Alexander Rechsteiner Mar 14 at 10:52
This software is completely useless –  happy Mar 15 at 7:37
@happy I didn't have it installed very long. Lucier wanted something like what you find in the Linux desktop environments, and this reminded me of that. –  Louis May 9 at 20:48

Windows 8 doesn't have built-in support for multiple desktops, but there are a number of utilities out there that add this functionality.

A quick Google search turns up VirtuaWin and Dexpot, both of which are free.

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I'm a longtime VirtuaWin user (currently on Windows 8). It allows for sophisticated hotkey configuration and my config mimics Mac/Openbox. One set of keystrokes for all systems. –  Mike Aug 6 at 21:40

refer to this artcile for a more comprehensive answer. have been using dexpot for many years without worry, though it can be a drain on the system if you are running a more basic system. "desktops" is much lighter on system resources.


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Nice one thanks –  Lucifer Jun 11 '13 at 6:31

protected by Community Apr 29 at 19:28


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