How to disable sticky corners in Windows 8?

I have 2 monitors and in Windows 7 I used to just mouse-flick maximized windows from one monitor to the other.

With Windows 8 however (charms disabled), my mouse hangs in the corners while doing this. This is because as described at the end of this article, an "invisible barrier" of 6 pixels has now been added:

Sticky Corners in Win8

Thus I'm unable to have a smooth experience for window movement across monitors as I did back in Windows 7. (Both my monitors are aligned in the settings to the top, so that isn't the problem).

How do I disable the mouse from stopping in the corners when going from one monitor to the other?

Edit: So it seems this is not possible without programming effort. I am currently writing a small tool to circumvent this nuisance. It's already working, I'm just touching up on the visuals :)

Edit2: https://mouseunsticky.codeplex.com/

Arista2

Posted 2012-11-02T17:56:39.440

Reputation: 791

1Another windows 8 multi-monitor change is the addition of a MouseMonitorEscapeSpeed setting, which makes the cursor stick to the edge of a monitor when moved slowly. Disable it by setting HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Control Panel/Desktop/MouseMonitorEscapeSpeed to 0 – Luna – 2014-07-26T18:25:25.120

4Not a solution to your exact problem, but an alternative way of doing this would be: Windows key + Shift + Left/Right arrow to quickly move apps from one monitor to the other. – Mufasa – 2012-11-02T18:03:23.977

And here I thought it was totally useless because the corners weren't big enough... – Shinrai – 2012-11-02T19:16:44.243

5Codeplex link is broken. – Drew Noakes – 2012-12-19T14:46:03.397

Answers

You can get around this with a simple registry change.

If you wish to just change it for the current user find MouseCornerClipLength in HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop\ and set the value to 0 (from 6)

If you wish to disable it everywhere:

In registry, search: MouseCornerClipLength
Set the value to 0 (from 6)
Repeat (there is more than one key with this name, I'm not sure which one(s) are necessary)
Restart

This stops your mouse catching and is perfect, you can still use the charms bar without issue on the outside edge of your monitors as easily as before (exactly as I wanted).

I created a thread a while ago about this here.

Tim

Posted 2012-11-02T17:56:39.440

Reputation: 604

+1; I've found that I need to disable charms bar otherwise the mouse still sticks when moving to a monitor on the right of the current monitor. – Bryan – 2014-07-12T18:54:52.523

This works perfectly for the top-right corner of my left monitor. However, my cursor still gets stuck in the bottom-right corner. – Big McLargeHuge – 2015-03-16T16:22:33.563

Unfortunately, this fix will not work in Windows 10. For that, there is another SuperUser question.

– palswim – 2015-10-15T23:34:23.910

3THANK YOU! You are a saviour. I had this annoying issue on multiple monitors with different resolutions, and almost banged my head. Thanks again! – Prasanth – 2013-07-02T13:38:49.340

7A quick search indicates that it's actually a per-user setting, and you can set it for the current user at

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop\MouseCornerClipLength

The other results were in similar locations in HKEY_USERS, which would be the corresponding setting for other users. – Bob – 2013-07-08T16:44:36.633

1Thank you, thank you. Lovely, smooth, top edge is back. Amazing how much something so simple can disrupt your work. – Xonatron – 2013-11-01T20:02:41.397

Tested and working

Open Regedit.

And go toHKEY_CURRENT_USER/Control Pannel/Desktop search for a key named MouseCornerClipLength and change the value from 6 to 0.

Ok and restart the machine

Addev

Posted 2012-11-02T17:56:39.440

Reputation: 137

Just a note that this one sets it for the current user. – Xonatron – 2013-11-01T20:03:15.930

PowerShell:

Set-ItemProperty -Path "HKCU:\Control Panel\Desktop" -Name MouseCornerClipLength -Type DWORD -Value 0

nbergen

Posted 2012-11-02T17:56:39.440

Reputation: 51

You can download a third-party program called Start 8. With it you can disable the sticky corners and you can also, if you want, get back the old Windows 7 style start menu.

It costs $5 but it has a free month trial.

Alfred Larsson

Posted 2012-11-02T17:56:39.440

Reputation: 639

The option is under Desktop >> Advanced. This worked great, thank you! – void.pointer – 2015-11-13T16:12:03.937

That is incorrect. It let's you disable the hot corner charms, but not the sticky pixels. – Arista2 – 2012-11-03T01:59:22.710

There is a program called Skip Metro Suite. You can use it for diasbling all hot corners of Windows 8. You can download from here: http://winaero.com/download.php?view.33

enter image description here

Olcay Ertaş

Posted 2012-11-02T17:56:39.440

Reputation: 42

-3

Until someone comes out with a hack, this will continue to be a setting built into Windows 8. You'll unfortunately have to get used to watching those corners, and eventually this will become second nature.

mcandre

Posted 2012-11-02T17:56:39.440

Reputation: 2 696

-3

They can't be disabled. I wish we could vote on features to be added/removed from W8!

Jerry Nixon

Posted 2012-11-02T17:56:39.440

Reputation: 1 228