Windows + Shift + S New Way To Take Screenshots – Windows 10 Creators Update

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There is a new way you can take screenshots in Windows 10 without additional third-party tools! With the latest Creators Update, Microsoft added a new system-wide shortcut to allow you to select a specific area of the screen and copy it to your clipboard.

Press Windows + Shift + S in build 15063 (Windows 10 Creators Update) or later will trigger the gray out overlay that you can use your mouse to click and select a specific area. Once you have selected the area it will get copied to your clipboard, you can then paste the image into an image editor or open paint and save the screenshot from your clipboard.

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Back in Windows 7, Microsoft introduced the Snipping Tool which does more or less the same. The slight difference between the Snipping Tool from Windows 7 and this new native method to capture a selective region on the screen is the missing system-wide keyboard shortcut. If you still prefer the Snipping Tool and would like to add a system-wide keyboard shortcut we got a tutorial for you here to follow.

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If you are a Mac user, this is VERY much like Shift + Command + 4 on Mac the only difference is you don’t get an image saved at a default(desktop) location. So keep in mind with the new shortcut, you might find it useful and handy when you need to take a screenshot spontaneously.

/update on May 7, 2018/

Microsoft is adding more features to this new screenshot experience for the upcoming major update. In Windows 10 version 1803 build 17661, the new Win + Shift + S keyboard shortcut bring up an area select tool to snip a screenshot and lets you share it instantly from the clipboard.

First of all, there is a new options bar popping up, providing you three different clipping options, rectangular clip, freeform clip, and full-screen.

win shift s new top options - Windows + Shift + S New Way To Take Screenshots - Windows 10 Creators Update

Then, as soon as you clipped something to the clipboard, a notification will be triggered automatically so you can easily annotate the screenshot by clicking on the notification.

win shift s notification - Windows + Shift + S New Way To Take Screenshots - Windows 10 Creators Update

24 COMMENTS

  1. Hi Jonathon

    Snipping Tool has so many more features, it will still be my go-to tool.

    I don’t know why you say this:

    “The only problem with Snipping Tool is you have to know ahead of the time with the intention to capture and have the tool open/ready.”

    It’s really not true, except for the rare situation where you want to capture something that depends on mouse location, like a menu or a mouse hover. And since Snipping Tool has a “Delay snip creation” option, it is still easily done.

    Plus you can map a keyboard shortcut to start it, so it’s just as easy to open. I also use Keytweak to map the useless ScrollLock (SCRLK) key to start Snipping Tool, making it really easy to remember.

  2. I work on a windows 10 PC with OneNote 2010 (business will not update to a later version of onenote and the current Windows 10 build is 14393. Sadly this has significantly increased my working day as the only way (using this version) to get the small screen clipping parts I need (often dropdown menus etc) is to use the ctrl print screen.

    Shockingly poor from Microsoft as a trainer who creates a large amount of documentation for my organisation, Windows S was always my “go to” option. Would like to know which idiot decided to turn that into Search!

    • Well, you can disable it by adding this registry string DisabledHotkeys and setting its value to S under:

      HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced

      You will need to restart the Explorer process to have the change kicked in.

  3. I woul like to change the location a screen shot is saved when I use the Shift S command. The documentation I find refers to a screen shot folder, which is not the case when saving screen shots from video. It just dumps them into my pictures folder on the C drive which I need to change.
    How can I change this setting.

  4. It usually work for me, but right now it isn’t. Windows 10 Home edition. No one note or anything, just snipping tool. Win + Shift + S does nothing and only behaves as if I’m pressing the windows logo button. It sometimes fixes itself but I don’t know what it does.

    • It goes to your clipboard as if you copied it from somewhere with CTRL+C or Copy function.
      You can paste it in programs such as Word or Paint using CTRL+V.

  5. what a rubbish change, taking multiple screenshots each one has to be found on clipboard then saved somewhere else to find it again later to use it if you can. Probably filling my laptop memory up somewhere and I can’t find it. Just give the option to save to a file we will all know where to go get the screenshots….it is a real pain to use

  6. Typical Microsoft… Did 50% of the job. Gotta love these ‘upgrades’ that remove features. Saving has always been essential for screenshots.

    • This shortcut is a simpler version of Snip and Sketch app. You can also open that similar to snipping tool(which still exists btw) and it has far more features for capturing screenshots outside of screen video capture that third-party apps offer..

  7. i cannot find my clipboard. I am looking for the image that I took by using windows shift and s.
    Does it get stored in another folder? the clipboard function is not showing for me.

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