HIGHDPIAWARE for all apps in Windows 10?

Question

I'm using Windows 10 and currently, I specifically set for each app, the HIGHDPIAWARE (high-DPI scaling) attribute in registry key which is found in :

HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\AppCompatFlags\Layers

With these values :

But I really don't want to specify each app for that feature.

Question:

How can I make all apps to be HIGHDPIAWARE?

Answer 1

You can't. Old applications cannot be made high-dpi aware without any changes, because that needs the app to use the newer high-dpi APIs. Apps must declare themselves as high-dpi aware via a manifest file or some API calls, otherwise Windows will scale them bitmap-wise which makes them blurry. That's what the above registry key is about. The detail settings are like this

• HIGHDPIAWARE: Disable Display Scaling on High DPI Settings - Scaling performed by: Application (Win7/10)
• DPIUNAWARE: Scaling performed by: Application (Win10 build 15002+)
• GDIDPISCALING DPIUNAWARE: Scaling performed by: System (Enhanced) (Win10 build 15002+)

https://ss64.com/nt/syntax-compatibility.html

In fact that key is exactly the same as the dpi-override settings in compatibility tab if you open the *.exe file's properties

So setting HIGHDPIAWARE in ...\AppCompatFlags\Layers doesn't automatically make your app hi-dpi aware. It just makes Windows thinks that the app is hi-dpi aware and disable scaling. The app is shown at 100% scaling so it'll be smaller on high-dpi displays, but the result is sharper

Of course you can set the flag for multiple apps at once, but it's not the way to solve your issue. Overriding high-dpi settings for all apps may make real high-dpi aware apps misbehave

See also

• How to force high-dpi scaling?
• What does "Disable Display Scaling on High DPI Settings" on Windows 10 mean?
• Windows scaling issues for high-DPI devices
• How to make the Windows Desktop application work well on High-DPI Displays and Fix Blurry Fonts