I swapped 5 built-in Windows apps for open-source ones for a month, and only 3 survived

Released Oct 12, 2026, 4:31 PM EDT

Oluwademilade is a dental practitioner and tech lover with over 5 years of composing experience. He signed up with the MUO group in 2022 and covers a vast array of subjects, consisting of customer tech, iOS, Android, expert system, hardware, software application, and cybersecurity. In addition to his work at MUO, his writing has actually appeared on HowtoGeekCryptoknowmicsTechNerdinessand SlashGear[

Oluwademilade made a Bachelor of Dental Surgery degree from the University of Ibadan’s College of Medicine in Nigeria and has actually operated in both medical facility and personal oral practice settings. While at university, he was acknowledged for his participation in civil service and was called a Global Goals Action Ambassador by a trainee company associated with the United Nations. He got the acknowledgment in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in 2020 for his work promoting the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

In his downtime, Oluwademilade delights in evaluating brand-new AI apps and functions, fixing tech issues for friends and family, finding out brand-new coding languages, and taking a trip whenever he gets the possibility.

Windows 11 has actually reached an unusual point where numerous of its integrated apps are in fact respectable. Note pad remembers what I was doing, Snipping Tool can pull text from screenshots, Paint has layers and background elimination, and File Explorer lastly has tabs. Microsoft has actually invested years repairing a lot of the factors I utilized to change this things on the first day.

Naturally, I changed 5 of them anyhow.

For a month, each open-source option had to be the app I reached for. I altered file associations and faster ways anywhere Windows let me, then attempted to utilize my PC generally and forget I was running an experiment at all. That wound up being the very best test since the apps that endured weren’t always the ones packed with the most functions. After a while, I simply began utilizing them without thinking of the reality that they were replacements.

VLC

Media Player never ever provided me a factor to leave, VLC did anyhow

• Credit: Keval Shukla/ MUO

Media Player is completely qualified with regional music and video, that made VLC seem like the most foreseeable swap on this list. I currently understood it might swallow an unreasonable series of file formats, deal with discs and network streams, and roam far outside the typical task description of a media gamer. We’ve covered numerous of those less apparent things VLC can do beyond playing videos.

The month offered me a much better factor to keep it, however, and I’ve stopped questioning which app I need to open.

Videos with subtitles went directly to VLC, as did any strange file I presumed Media Player may have viewpoints about. Network streams remained there too, and VLC provided me adequate playback controls to fiddle with whenever a video wasn’t acting the method I desired. I’ve even utilized it for jobs like eliminating audio from a video file, which is an outrageous quantity of energy from the app that opens when I double-click an MP4.

By the end of the month, sending out media to VLC had actually ended up being muscle memory. Media Player never ever provided me some magnificent factor to ditch it, and honestly, it didn’t require to. I had actually just stopped thinking of which gamer to utilize.

VLC remained.

It turned PrtSc into a workflow

Snipping Tool set up a more powerful battle than I anticipated. Microsoft’s screenshot app can tape-record the screen, pull text with OCR, edit delicate details, annotate captures, and cover the majority of the fast screenshot tasks individuals really toss at it.

My screenshots hardly ever end when I struck PrtSc. I generally desire the image conserved someplace particular, copied to the clipboard, cut or increased, and prepared for whatever comes next. ShareX can chain those actions together, which is a huge factor it has actually ended up being such a powerful screenshot tool for Windows power users.

The very first couple of days were primarily me opening one settings page and in some way discovering 2 more behind it. ShareX hands you a challenging quantity of control in advance and leaves you to determine which parts you really appreciate.

As soon as I established my hotkeys and after-capture jobs, a screenshot might conserve itself to the ideal folder and arrive on my clipboard at the exact same time, without another lap through menus and dialogs. ShareX can likewise change a number of smaller sized Windows energies by itself, although I stopped short of letting one screenshot app phase a hostile takeover of my desktop.

A week or more in, returning to Snipping Tool indicated reestablishing actions I had actually currently stopped thinking of. ShareX remained.

Note pad++

Note pad got sufficient to make this uncomfortable

I anticipated this contrast to be over in about 4 minutes. Modern Notepad had other strategies.

Microsoft has actually offered it tabs, session remediation, spellcheck, autocorrect, and light-weight format, so the old joke about Notepad being fossilized Windows furnishings does not truly land any longer. For writing a telephone number, removing format from copied text, or keeping a momentary note around, I still choose how tidy and on-the-spot it is.

Requiring Notepad++ into those exact same tasks for a month made its excesses relatively apparent. I moved on to logs, JSON files, setup files, and messy blocks of text where the very same pattern required altering throughout lots of lines, and the contest ended up being much less fascinating.

Syntax highlighting, regex search and change, numerous views, and macros offered Notepad++ someplace to pursue Notepad had actually currently lacked roadway. I obviously invest adequate time in that area for the additional equipment to be worth keeping around.

Note pad still wins when I require 5 seconds and a blank window. Note pad++ won enough of whatever else that it kept the default association.

Krita

It was extremely overqualified for Paint’s task

On paper, Krita must have destroyed Paint. It’s developed for digital painting, illustration, comics, and animation, so I was bringing a massive quantity of software application to tasks that normally include cropping an image and proceeding with my day. If major image development is the objective, the distinctions are a lot easier to value in a Krita and GIMP contrast than in any contrast with Microsoft Paint.

I open Paint when an image is 400 pixels too broad, when an internet browser tab requires cropping out, when 2 images require to share one canvas, or when a background needs to vanish before I proceed. Modern Paint deals with those tasks with layers, openness, and background elimination inside a user interface that requests for really little event or concentration.

Krita finished every job I provided it, however numerous of them had me reaching past a disconcerting quantity of ability simply to do something quite fundamental. ShareX had actually currently soaked up the majority of my screenshot annotation work, leaving Krita with a little handful of tasks that were merely quicker to end up in Paint.

Krita is remaining set up due to the fact that it’s outstanding at what it was really developed to do. Paint got its old task back.

Files

Explorer won since Windows owns the pipes

Files came closest to changing File Explorer for excellent. Dual-pane searching ends up being challenging to give up as soon as you have actually invested a while moving folders in between drives, and functions such as tags, adjustable designs, column view, and a command scheme make File Explorer look practically austere by contrast.

Individuals can invest years checking options and still wind up returning to File Explorer. A file supervisor sits annoyingly near Windows’ pipes.

Files can register itself as the default file supervisor through a speculative workaround that obstructs File Explorer calls and customizes Registry entries. Its own documents suggests supporting the Registry initially, and even then, the workaround can not change every Windows file picker or warranty that another application will not call Explorer straight.

Throughout the month, that disparity troubled me more than File Explorer’s missing out on power-user functions. Changing a media gamer is easy enough due to the fact that another app opens the video. Changing Explorer implies convincing Windows to work together each time some other part of the os wishes to open a folder, and Windows is not constantly a ready accomplice.

Files is remaining set up for the events when double panes and much heavier file management validate the additional muscle. Submit Explorer got the default task back.

3 replacements endured, and functions weren’t the choosing aspect

I ended up the month with a little bit more regard for uninteresting software application. An app that’s currently woven into Windows, opens where the os anticipates it, and manages regular tasks without making me consider it has a quite huge head start.

I’m still delighted to change integrated Windows apps when another tool offers me an engaging factor. 3 of these did. The other 2 advised me that doubling the variety of settings does not immediately count as an upgrade.