It looks like Microsoft has once again shipped dodgy Windows 11 updates, with reports suggesting that the two latest cumulative updates have been causing serious issues with the Start menu.
The updates in question are KB5015882 and KB5015814, and it looks like they’ve introduced a bug which causes to Start menu to disappear when you click to open it.
That’s a pretty major issue, considering how integral the Start menu is to Windows 11, and it’s an unwelcome reminder of the dark days of Windows 10 updates, where for a time Microsoft was bringing out updates that seemed to cause more issues than they fixed.
Windows 11 updates have thankfully been a lot more dependable, but we’d hate to see Microsoft slipping back into its old ways.
As Windows Latest reports, Microsoft has at least acknowledged there’s an issue, posting that “we have received reports that a small number of devices might be unable to open the Start menu. On affected devices, clicking or selecting the Start button or using the Windows key on your keyboard might have no effect.”
This is a good sign, as it shows that Microsoft is aware of the issue and is actively working on a fix.
How to fix Windows 11 Start menu problems
If you have a device that's experiencing this issue, you can hold tight, as Microsoft has released a server-side emergency update which should fix the issue automatically – but that could take up to 24 hours to arrive on your device.
If you can’t wait that long, you can download the Windows 11 21H2 KB5014668 220721_04201 Known Issue Rollback (the link downloads direct from Microsoft’s site), which will rollback the update to fix the problem.
Microsoft also suggests restarting your device, which could help get the emergency fix faster.
While we commend Microsoft for its speedy response to this, let’s hope this broken update is just an unfortunate one-off, and not a hint of more Windows 11 problems to come.
