Use Small Icons on the Windows 7 Taskbar and Desktop

With a default installation of Windows 7, you might notice a couple of thing immediately such as the large desktop icons and the large taskbar! I’m personally not a big fan of huge icons anywhere on my computer!

And to me, a large taskbar is a waste of precious real estate. I like the smallest taskbar possible without having to auto-hide, a feature I’m also not a fan of.

Here is what my desktop and taskbar looked like on Windows 7 when I first installed it:

Way too big! In this article, I’ll show you how to reduce the size of the desktop icons and the taskbar in Windows 7.

Use Small Icons on Windows 7 Taskbar

To do this, right-click on an empty space in the taskbar and click on Properties.

On the Taskbar tab, check the Use small icons box. Then click the OK button.

Here’s a screenshot with the new smaller taskbar in comparison to the large desktop icons.

Much better! Of course, you can uncheck that box if you prefer the large icons on the taskbar.

Reduce Size of Desktop Icons in Windows 7

OK, so how about those large desktop icons? That’s also very easy to change. Simply right-click anywhere on the desktop and click on View. In the menu, you can choose how large you want the icons to be.

I prefer small icons, so that I can fit more on my desktop and see more of my wallpaper in the background. Large icons are absolutely huge and probably only useful if you have vision problems.

And now you can see I’m using small icons on the desktop and in the taskbar! Excellent!