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Why Does Windows 11 Keep Hiding My System Tray Icons? (Taskbar Icons Missing)
Has anyone figured out why Windows 11 keeps hiding system tray icons? My taskbar icons go missing constantly, and I can’t get certain apps to stay visible. Sometimes they show up under the taskbar ov...
One distinction may be useful here: there appears to be a separate failure mode where this is not just individual tray icons being hidden or moved into the overflow area.
In my Windows 11 25H2 lab, the entire notification area disappeared, including the clock, network, volume, and system tray icons.
I reproduced the behavior with KB5121003, confirmed that rolling back to build 26200.8037 restored the tray, and then reproduced the same symptom again after installing KB5120998.
I documented the build-by-build comparison and screenshots here in case anyone is seeing the complete tray disappear rather than only individual icons being hidden:
https://ceyhunkirmizitas.net/windows-11-25h2-system-tray-disappears-kb5121003-kb5120998/