7 Easy Ways to Take Screenshots in Windows 11

Snipping Tool panel

The built-in Snipping Tool lets you snap, save, annotate and share screenshots of all or a portion of your screen. It can also record a video — with sound — of a window on your desktop. The easiest way to call up the Snipping Tool is by using the keyboard shortcut Windows key + Shift + S.

Either method will dim your screen and open a tiny panel at the top of your screen that lets you choose which type of screenshot you want to take: rectangular, freeform, window or full-screen.

Once you take your screenshot, it will be saved to your clipboard and show up momentarily as a notification in the lower-right corner of your screen. Click the notification to open the screenshot in the Snipping Tool app to annotate, save or share it. (If you miss the notification, open the notification panel and you’ll see it sitting there.)

To start recording a video, you need to highlight a portion of your screen and then click Start from the small panel at the top of your screen. You can choose to record system audio or sound from the microphone — or both.