Microsoft is presently promoting some of its products in the sign-out flyout menu that shows up while tapping the user icon in the Windows 11 start menu.
This new Windows 11 “feature” was found by Windows fan Tuna, who shared a few screenshots of advertisement notifications in the Accounts flyout.
Microsoft promotes the OneDrive file hosting service and goads clients to make or finish their Microsoft accounts.
Those reacting to this via social media had an adverse reaction to Redmond’s decision to show promotional messages in the start menu.
A few said that Windows 11 is “getting worse in each and every update it gets,” while others added that this is a weird choice given that “half of the Start Menu is for recommendations” anyway.
BleepingComputer has additionally had a go at replicating this on multiple Windows 11 systems, however we got no ads.
This clues at A/B testing experiment trying to check the progress of such a “feature” on gadgets running Windows Insider builds or the organization pushing such ads to a limited set of customers.
Ads in the File Explorer, the Start Menu, and more
Redmond has pushed ads within the UI of Microsoft Office apps or different Windows apps previously.
In August, the organization showed ads for Microsoft 365 Family subscriptions to Office 2021 customers, with discounts of more than $28 for a 3-month Family plan subscription.
Months earlier, in March, Windows Insiders began seeing ads for some Microsoft products (including Microsoft Editor) in the File Explorer app.
File Explorer additionally got infused with promotional messages in 2016 when Redmond used it to show OneDrive advertisements.
Two years ago, the Windows 10 Wordpad application showed ads pushing Microsoft’s free Office web applications in its menu bar.
Microsoft was additionally found advertising its Microsoft Edge web browser in the Windows 10 Start Menu when clients looked for competing browsers.
Unfortunately, some of these advertisement tests likewise had potentially negative results: Microsoft incidentally broke the Windows Start Menu and Taskbar while testing Microsoft Teams ads on Windows Insider builds systems.
A Microsoft representative was not accessible for comment when contacted by BleepingComputer earlier today.
