How to disable all caps menu titles in Visual Studio

584
votes

I assume the title is self explanatory. Just want to change the look of the Visual Studio 2012 not to show menu title in all capital letters.

12
visual-studio-2012visual-studio-2013
If you have a large widescreen monitor with a very high resolution to maximize the amount of code you can see, the all caps menu is actually quite nice. Different strokes for different folks I guess. – Code Maverick
I've posted the workaround (for regedit and PowerShell) to connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/details/775717/… – Grault
Looks like they are reverting to title case in Visual Studio 14 and making this an environment option in Visual Studio 2013 Update 3. visualstudio.uservoice.com/forums/121579-visual-studio/… – patridge
for newer versions (like Visual Studio 2013 Update 4 or probably VS 2015) there is an option for this. go to Tools > Options > Environment and select Turn off upper case in the menu bar option – S.Serpooshan

12 Answers

619
votes

Richard Banks posted about a registry key for just such a tweak.

Visual Studio 2012 (Full)

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\General
DWORD: SuppressUppercaseConversion
Value: 1

In PowerShell, you can run this to set that registry key and the uppercase goes away.

Set-ItemProperty -Path HKCU:\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\General -Name SuppressUppercaseConversion -Type DWord -Value 1

Visual Studio Express 2012

The above registry key is not the one that will affect Visual Studio Express 2012 RC. A comment by FormatC showed up on Banks post about the key for Express. You can find that key mentioned in Mike Gleason's answer or run the following PowerShell command to set it.

Set-ItemProperty -Path HKCU:\Software\Microsoft\VSWinExpress\11.0\General -Name SuppressUppercaseConversion -Type DWord -Value 1

Visual Studio Express 2012 for Web

Set-ItemProperty -Path HKCU:\Software\Microsoft\VWDExpress\11.0\General -Name SuppressUppercaseConversion -Type DWord -Value 1

Visual Studio 2013

Replace 11.0 with 12.0 in the registry keys above.

Visual Studio 2015 Developer Preview

Replace 11.0 with 14.0 in the registry keys above.

66
votes

I have written an extension which will do this for you.

You can download it from the Visual Studio Gallery:

It can also hide main menu altogether and have it appear only on mouse over or alt key press (like in IE)

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55
votes

After years Microsoft has changed their mind on this feature. As of Visual Studio 2013 Update 3 RC, an option has been added to change between mixed case and upper case: Tools -> Options -> Environment -> General -> Turn off upper case in the menu bar
Obviously this is not for VS 2012 but going forward this option will be there.

Here is the notification from Brian Harry of Microsoft:

Mixed Case Menus – I know I’m going to get some feedback on this one :) This is a long standing request by a vocal portion of the VS user base since VS 2012 to change the “ALL CAPS” menus. In VS 2013 Update 3, we have added a Tools –> Options setting to control whether you see ALL CAPS or Mixed Case. The default is still ALL CAPS but, if you change it, it will persist across upgrades and will roam across your IDE instances using the VS Online roaming settings feature (if you log into VS so it knows who you are).

15
votes

And for

Visual Studio Express 2012 for Windows Desktop

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\WDExpress\11.0\General
DWORD: SuppressUppercaseConversion
Value: 1

I guess the reason MS omitted any mention of Visual Studio from the keyname is that such a mention might help someone identify the key :)

12
votes

The VS Commands extension can do this and is one of the most popular on the gallery. Worth checking out!

enter image description here

http://visualstudiogallery.msdn.microsoft.com/a83505c6-77b3-44a6-b53b-73d77cba84c8?SRC=VSIDE

8
votes

Now that Visual Studio 2015 has changed the default back to Title Case, for those crazies like me who had gotten used to ALL CAPS, you can change it back by disabling the following option:

  • Tools -> Options -> Environment -> General -> Apply title case styling to menu bar
8
votes

Visual Studio 2015 Community Edition does not respond to the SuppressUppercaseConversion registry value.

The answer is to enable the option boflynn identified:

• Tools -> Options -> Environment -> General -> Apply title case styling to menu bar

In my case that setting was not on by default, perhaps since I ported my VS 2013 settings.

-Noel

7
votes

For express use:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VSWinExpress\11.0\GeneralSuppressUppercaseConversion

Credit to FormatC

6
votes

I have been using the following reg files to enable/disable the lowercasing in Visual Studio 2012 and Visual Studio 2013:

http://erwinmayer.com/dl/VS2012_ALLCAPS_Toggle.zip http://erwinmayer.com/dl/VS2013_ALLCAPS_Toggle.zip

Just double click on VS201x_ALLCAPS_Disable.reg inside the archive to disable all caps menu titles, and VS201x_ALLCAPS_Enable.reg to re-enable them.

You can easily edit the reg files before with a text editor to see what they contain.

2
votes

For Visual Studio 2012 Express for Windows Phone, use

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VPDExpress\11.0\General\SuppressUppercaseConversion
1
votes

I think "VSCommands for Visual Studio 2012" is the best option for this.

Grab this plugin from here: http://visualstudiogallery.msdn.microsoft.com/a83505c6-77b3-44a6-b53b-73d77cba84c8

0
votes

Microsoft Visual Studio Community 2019

Check the option Apply title case styling to menu bar

which can be found in Tools > Options > Environment > General