Office is too slow, so Microsoft is making it load at Windows startup

You know how every annoying Windows program wants to launch as soon as you boot up your computer? Well, now Office is going to do that, too. A new “Startup Boost” function will set Office to load when Windows starts up, which will make apps like Word and Excel launch faster—while making the rest of your computer slower. Whoopie.

I’m being flippant, but it’s understandable that Microsoft would want to give Office a performance boost, even if it is somewhat illusory. And in the company’s defense, the announcement in the Microsoft 365 Message Center Archive (spotted by The Verge) does say that the new tool will only be enabled on PCs that have at least 8GB of RAM and 5GB of free disk space. I think even trying to run Windows 11 on just 8GB of RAM is kind of optimistic these days, but at least there’s a floor.

A cynic might wonder why Microsoft is making Office start when the computer boots instead of, you know, just making Office more efficient so it can run faster. (There’s no second part to that statement. The cynic is me. I want Office to be more efficient.)

The update to the Microsoft 365 installer will initially only apply to Microsoft Word when it rolls out in mid-May, then spread to other Office programs later. And yes, you will be able to disable this feature. End users can turn it off in Word’s settings or in the Task Scheduler.