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I'm looking for a shortcut or an easy way to make a window fill the whole screen, but without maximizing it.

Right now, I do this by moving the window in the top left corner of the screen then dragging the sides to make it fit the whole screen, but it's a bit tedious when it needs to be done several times.

Is there any easy way to do this in Windows 7?

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  • what is wrong with maximize? Did you try F11 key
    – Moab
    Commented Nov 4, 2012 at 7:25
  • There's a reason why I'm asking this but would be too long to detail here. Obviously I know about the maximize button, F11 and so on...
    – laurent
    Commented Nov 4, 2012 at 7:55
  • @Laurent: here is a lot of space, please explain the difference in your use-case between the maximization button (and i don't mean fullscreen-f11) and what you are trying to achieve.
    – akira
    Commented Nov 4, 2012 at 8:28
  • @akira, I honestly don't know how to explain it in simple words. Basically, it involves Google Chrome, Winamp, windows that are always on top, the title bar, Google Chrome tabs and the fact that Chrome in "Maximize" mode doesn't behave like a standard window. So I need to manually resize the window instead of clicking Maximize.
    – laurent
    Commented Nov 4, 2012 at 8:37
  • 1
    I love how mush push-back you got on the validity of this question.
    – orion elenzil
    Commented Apr 6, 2022 at 16:26

8 Answers 8

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Something like Sizer might be what you're looking for:

1 2 3 4

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  • Exactly what I needed, and it works great. Thanks a lot!
    – laurent
    Commented Nov 5, 2012 at 3:53
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You can drag the window to left side of the screen (Win + left arrow) to fill the left half of the screen and then drag just the one remaining side of the window to the other side of the screen.

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There is at least one reasonably quick way to do this on Windows 7:

  1. Snap the window to one side of the screen – drag the window to the right or left side of the screen until the screen lights up, then release. You can also do this with the keyboard: Win-key + left/right arrow key
  2. Hit Alt + Space, then the "S" key to enter keyboard resizing mode.
  3. Hit the right or left arrow key repeatedly or hold it down until the edge of the screen becomes flush with the window's border. Hit Enter.
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No it is not possible unless you use your mouse. You can maximize it by pressing F11 .

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  • <kbd>f11</kbd> is usually used to FULLSCREEN a window. maximization is to use the available space, minus the toolbar for example.
    – akira
    Commented Nov 4, 2012 at 8:29
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Windows key + up arrow will maximize it if it isn't already.

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Try dragging the title bar straight up to the top of the screen. Drag it down to return to the previous size.

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I had a similar problem with an application which behaved unexpectedly when maximized so I wanted to expand it to fit the whole screen without maximizing it. I wrote a simple command line tool (ExpandWnd) for that purpose so I can script and automate things.

expandwnd "<window title>"

<window title> is case sensitive and will match the first window whose title contains <window title> and expand it to fit the whole work area of its current display (in case of an multip-display environment).

Although this question is quite old maybe someone can also make use of that command line tool.

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Update: Sizer 4 is definitely what you want. (More options than v3.34 linked in another answer.)

Add a window size to the screen size (or bigger) and it will expand it as much as it can without going outside the screen and put it on a hotkey. You can also add hotkeys for repositioning without resizing on a different hotkey.

I had this issue switching between my laptop and a large 55" TV-- if I use "Maximize" on my laptop, when I plug it into the TV, the windows are ridiculously big, and I do not want that. Sizer lets me make it as big as the laptop screen without it getting blown up the next time I plug it into the TV.

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