Disable Windows Sidebar in Vista

by Lowell Heddings on January 7th, 2007

Let’s be honest: If you are reading this article, then you probably think the Windows Sidebar in Windows Vista is cheesy and useless. Thankfully it’s also easy to disable.

To disable the sidebar, right click on the sidebar or sidebar icon, and choose properties:

sidebar-disable-1.png

Uncheck the “Start Sidebar when Windows starts” checkbox:

sidebar-disable-2.png

Then right-click on the icon, and choose Exit to close the sidebar:

sidebar-disable-3.png

Your sidebar should now be gone, and won’t start back up with Windows anymore.

Lowell Heddings, better known online as the How-To Geek, spends all his free time bringing you fresh geekery on a daily basis. You can follow him on if you'd like.