How to Restore Aero Glass Transparency in Windows 10

Aero Glass transparency was an effect included in Windows 7’s taskbar and windows. However, this transparency has largely disappeared in Windows 10. If you’re looking for a way to restore the transparency from earlier Windows platforms, check out Glass2k.

To run this program, open the Glass2k page on Softpedia. Then click the DOWNLOAD NOW button there to save Glass2k to windows. No installation is required, so you can click the saved file to open the software’s window below. It also has a system try icon that you can right-click to select Settings and open the window shown below.

When you’ve opened the software, you should right-click anywhere in the window to open the transparency pop-up menu shown in the shot below. That opens a menu from which you can adjust the transparency level of the selected window.

Select a percentage number from there to add more transparency to the selected window. So selecting 40% makes the window more transparent, and a 90% setting is less transparent. Press No Glass-Effect to remove the transparency.

It’s better to press the keyboard shortcuts to select a transparency level. Select a hotkey, such as Ctrl + Shift, from the Keyboard Shortcuts drop-down menu. Then press Ctrl + Shift, or whatever hotkey you chose, and a number from one to nine. Select nine to switch the transparency to 90%, eight to 80% and so on.

Note that the selected transparency level will only apply to the active (selected) window. That is unless you select the Auto-Remember every window’s Transparency Settings option and press Save. Then the transparency selected is applied to all the setting windows.

There’s an option in Windows 10 that you can add transparency to the taskbar with, as covered in this post, but you can’t increase the amount of transparency with that setting. The Glass2k window also includes a Taskbar Transparency bar. You can drag that bar left to add more transparency to the taskbar. Drag it right to reduce the transparency level. Click Save to apply the settings.

So with Glass2k you can now restore Aero Glass transparency in Windows 10. The only difference is that Glass2k adds transparency to the whole window, not just its title bar. Aero Glass is also another software package you could try out to restore the transparency in Windows 10.