7 tasks you can automate on Windows 11

Using a computer is supposed to speed up your workflow, but sometimes, repetitive processes can really slow things down and waste your time. Thankfully, whether it’s through built-in tools or third-party apps, there are plenty of ways you can automate settings and actions on your Windows 11 PC to make things easier for yourself.

We’ve rounded up a few of these things you can try for yourself to make your life easier. These range from very basic to fairly complicated, so let’s get right into it.

7

Night light

This just barely counts

We’re starting off with a bit of a lame one, but it is technically an automation. It’s built right into Windows and frankly, it’s very useful.

Night light
is a feature in Windows 11 that reduces the blue light emissions of your display, making it easier on your eyes at nighttime, reducing fatigue and potentially helping you sleep better (though this is disputed).

One thing that Windows 11 doesn’t do out of the box, though, is enable Night light automatically. But if you want to, you can go into the Settings app (in the Display category) and make it so Night light is set to run on a schedule. You can align it with the sunset and sunrise times where you live, or you can set custom hours of your own. It’s a very basic automation, but one you should definitely consider.

6

Dark mode

It (usually) looks better

Now, I’m not trying to be a dark mode snob like so many people online, but I think it’s a fairly common sentiment on the internet that dark mode just looks nicer. It’s easier on the eyes, especially at night, and the darker backgrounds can help colors pop out more. However, during daytime, dark mode can make some things harder to to read or fully appreciate, so it’s nice to have light mode, too. The problem is switching between the two modes is kind of a waste of time once you start doing it every day.

Thankfully, there’s an app called Auto Dark Mode to help with exactly that. As the name implies, Auto Dark Mode can automatically enable or disable dark mode on your Windows PC using a series of custom rules that make it work perfectly for you. Not only can you set the times at which the transition happens, but you can set exceptions, such as not switching while you’re playing a game, for example. You can also customize the dark theme that you want to use.

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In Windows, changing between light and dark modes only changes that setting, but Auto Dark Mode can make it so that dark mode also has a different accent color.

There are a lot more options you can dive into with Auto Dark Mode, and it’s really cool to see.

5

Monitor brightness

I’m not just talking about laptops with brightness sensors

While we’re on the topic of things being easier on the ways, we have to talk about screen brightness, and how dangerous it is to have a bright monitor in front of your face in a dark room for long periods of time. However, we often forget to change the brightness of our screens when it gets dark, and that’s why apps like Twinkle Tray can be useful.

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Twinkle Tray is an app that adds a brightness slider to your Windows taskbar and it lets you control the brightness for all connected monitors, something that Windows can’t do. But one particular feature of Twinkle Tray is the ability to set brightness adjustments based on the time of day, so you can have higher brightness during daytime, and lower brightness at night so it’s easier on your eyes. Many laptops these days do have brightness sensors that change brightness automatically, but if you have a cheaper or older laptop, or you use a desktop with an external monitor, you might not have this, and a tool like Twinkle Tray can be a true eye saver.

4

Writing long repetitive text

Tired of typing the same thing over and over?

Whatever business you work in, there’s a good chance you have to frequently write the same thing multiple times. Maybe it’s your email address, phone number, or physical address, for example. It can get tedious to write this out every time once you’ve done it for a while, so a way to do it automatically would be great, and luckily, that’s something AutoHotKey can do.

::myemail::arealemailaddress@gmail.com

AutoHotKey (or AHK) is a program that can automate all kinds of things with keyboard shortcuts, and one of those things is text expansion. Basically, you can write a smaller piece of text and it automatically gets expanded into a larger chunk. So, if you want to write your email address, you can have a shortcut like “myemail” and it will automatically convert into your address. Setting up automation in AutoHotKey can feel a bit daunting at first, but there’s plenty of documentation to help you get started.

3

Launching apps

Make it snappy

Are you tired of digging through the Start menu to launch the apps you need? Well, AutoHotKey can help there, too. Keyboard shortcuts in AutoHotKey can do all kinds of things, including launching apps. Simply assign a keyboard shortcut to the executable file you want to run, and you’re good to go.

What’s even cooler is that you can also pass run parameters to the executable file, so you can run the program with specific arguments. For example, you can set Notepad to open a specific document, or simply add any argument supported by that program.

!1::Run 'notepad "C:\Users\joaoc\Documents\DO script test.txt"'

As another example, a web browser may allow you to launch a specific user profile. There’s a lot you can do depending on the program you’re running.

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2

Copying files

Keep things organized

We’ve all let your desktop or downloads folder get overrun by numerous files we create and download over time, and it gets messy and very hard to find what you want. Thankfully, there are automations you can set up to move files easily into other folders. AutoHotKey can help here, too.

Say, for example, you want all the images in your Downloads folder to go into the Pictures library. You can use a command like this one:

#2::FileMove "C:\Users\joaoc\Downloads\*.jpg", "C:\Users\joaoc\Pictures"

This will move all your downloaded .jpg files to the Pictures folder when you press Alt+2, so they’re easier to find. Of course, you can change the file extension or specify a name if you want to move something else or be more specific (and you can also change the shortcut itself).

There are other tools that can help with this, though, such as DropIt, which has a more user-friendly way to create automatic rules for moving files.

1

Windows updates

Don’t let them interrupt you

Finally, we have Windows updates, which can be very frustrating when left unchecked. However, thanks to PowerShell scripts, it’s pretty easy to automate Windows 11 updates. You just need to create a script that automatically checks for and installs updates on a regular basis at a time that is convenient to you. That way, all your updates are always installed and you shouldn’t be interrupted during work hours anymore.

Creating this script may seem a bit daunting at first, but we’ve written a thorough guide on how to do it, and if you follow our instructions, it’s not too difficult. It can definitely save you sokme headaches if you hate Windows update notifications or unexpected restarts.

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Make your life easier

This is just the beginning

Realistically, this list could go on for as long as you want it to, and I could have been cheeky and included a category just focused on what you can do with Power Automate. That tool, which is included in Windows 11, lets you automate basically any user interaction. You can record your actions as you use your computer, and that allows Power Automate to basically replicate all of your steps. And even then, that’s just the beginning of what you can do with it.

The point is automation can save you a lot of time in many different ways. The points above are great starting points, but depending on your workflow, there’s a lot more you can probably do.

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