Did you buy a new Windows 11 PC or do a fresh installation of the OS? Do you want your PC to be powerful and feature-complete from day one? Well, here are five niche apps that you should install to make Windows do what it can’t out of the box.
A fresh Windows 11 installation or a brand-new Windows laptop often feels like it’s missing something—and that’s because it is. Microsoft ships Windows 11 without several features we’ve come to expect from a modern operating system in 2025. Fortunately, you can fill most of those gaps simply by installing these five apps.
PowerToys
Microsoft PowerToys is an official power-user toolkit from Microsoft that adds a ton of advanced functionality to Windows 11. It serves as a one-stop solution for adding many useful features to the operating system—features that previously required installing dedicated, third-party apps.
Now, what puzzles me is why these features aren’t integrated into the OS by default—but fortunately, you can easily install the app from the Microsoft Store and set it up in seconds. The app unlocks a massive collection of tools, and I’d strongly recommend that you explore all of them to see what’s possible. That said, if you want a quick starting point, here are four PowerToys features worth enabling right away.
If you’re big on multitasking and window management, start with FancyZones—it’s like Windows’ Snap Layouts on steroids. It lets you create customizable window layouts so you can quickly snap your apps into them for a well-organized desktop experience. Then there’s Workspaces, which builds on this idea by letting you launch multiple apps in predefined layouts with a single shortcut.
Next, you have Text Extractor, which allows you to select any area of your screen and instantly copy the text within it to your clipboard—perfect for pulling text from images or websites that don’t allow you to copy their text. Finally, Always on Top lets you pin windows like Calculator or Notes so they always stay visible and never get buried under other app windows.
Syncthing
Syncthing is a peer-to-peer file syncing tool that might feel a bit strange if you’ve never used anything like it before. But once it clicks, you’ll understand why it made me ditch third-party cloud storage providers entirely.
Here’s how it works: install Syncthing on your Windows 11 PC, then install it on your phone, laptop, tablet, or any other device—it’s fully cross-platform. Next, set up a dedicated Syncthing folder on each device and pair those folders with one another. From that point on, whenever you add, edit, or delete a file in the folder on one device, the changes automatically sync to all the others. And yes, it will sync over Wi-Fi and cellular data.
One of the best things about Syncthing is how well it complements apps that store data locally. For example, I use Obsidian for note-taking and use Syncthing to sync my notes between my PC and Android phone—without relying on any cloud provider that might expose my data to a third party.
KDE Connect
KDE Connect is essentially Windows Phone Link on steroids—and it’s completely free and open-source. You simply install it on your Windows 11 PC and your phone, pair the two devices, and you’ve unlocked a full suite of features that Microsoft’s built-in solution can’t match.
For starters, you can use your phone as a trackpad or virtual keyboard for your PC, which is incredibly handy when you’re sitting on the couch. There’s also a presentation mode that turns your phone into a gyro-controlled pointer—just move your phone around and the cursor follows on your monitor, making it great for presentations. You can even use your phone to remotely lock or shut down your Windows 11 PC.
And of course, it covers all the basic stuff like clipboard sharing, notification mirroring, and wireless file transfers between devices. Better yet, since it’s open-source, you don’t have to worry about corporate data collection or hidden privacy trade-offs—your data stays between your devices.
Want More Privacy on Windows 11? Here Are 6 Features I Always Disable
Windows 11 is quietly collecting more data than you might think, but you can take control of your privacy.
MSI Afterburner
MSI Afterburner is a must-install if your Windows 11 PC has a dedicated graphics card—and no, it isn’t limited to GPUs made by MSI. It works with almost all NVIDIA and AMD GPUs. While the app is extremely popular among gamers, many non-gamers don’t even know it exists. That’s a shame, because anyone—from professional video editors to 3D designers—can benefit from it.
At its core, MSI Afterburner helps you adjust the clock speeds, voltage, and fan curves of your GPU. Increasing the clock speed—overclocking—can squeeze more performance out of your graphics card, while lowering voltage—undervolting—reduces power consumption and temperatures. When done carefully, an optimized overclocked-and-undervolted GPU can deliver better performance than the default configuration while also improving efficiency.
Beyond tuning, it’s also one of the best tools for monitoring your GPU performance. It includes the RivaTuner Statistics Server (RTSS), which provides a highly customizable on-screen display showing FPS along with temperature and usage stats for your GPU and CPU. This makes troubleshooting performance issues much easier—you can instantly see if an app is bottlenecked by your GPU or CPU, and also check temperature issues in real time. Not to mention, it’s an excellent way to quantitatively measure how well your games (or creative workloads) are performing.
Portmaster
If you love trying out different apps on your Windows PC—and I’m guessing you do, since you’re reading this—you should install Portmaster. It’s a free and open-source application firewall that monitors the network traffic of a specific app and can even block it from internet access.
If you recently downloaded an app you don’t fully trust, Portmaster can check if it’s connecting to the internet, which servers it’s talking to, and block its internet access entirely if something looks fishy. Of course, you can grant the app limited internet access by blocking specific connections while allowing everything else.
Beyond app-level network control, Portmaster can actively block trackers while you browse the web. It also includes a robust filter list that’ll prevent you from accidentally visiting any known malicious website or even NSFW content.
There you have it—five niche apps worth installing on day one to get more out of Windows 11.
