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You are here: Home / Support / MicroSoft / Use the Snipping Tool to Capture Menus

Use the Snipping Tool to Capture Menus

August 27, 2009 By Robert Owen 49 Comments

When Vista came on the scene one of the new features I thought was pretty cool was the new Snipping tool.  It’s a really useful little utility and for the most part it’s great.  In Windows 7, the tool is still there (no improvements that I can see).  But, one of the things about this little utility that bothered me was my inability to use it to capture context and other drop-down menus.  Every time I would open the menu I needed to capture, it would disappear as soon as I selected the Snipping Tool.

This really annoyed me.  There has to be a way!?  Well, it turns out there is a really simple solution for this.  To use the Snipping Tool to capture menus, follow these steps.

First, locate and start the Snipping Tool.  When the tool starts it will be in “New capture” mode.  Click Cancel but, don’t close the tool.  Next, open the menu you want to capture.  With that menu open, press the “Control” and “Print Screen” buttons on your keyboard.  This will re-activate the Snipping Tool in the “New Capture” mode.  Now just capture your image.

menu-snip1menu-snip2

As you can see above, it works quite well.   This, “work-around”,  functions the same in Windows Vista and in Windows 7.  I’ve also tried it on my laptop and desktop and there was no difference in function.

© 2009, Robert Owen. All rights reserved.

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Filed Under: MicroSoft, Random - TidBit Tagged With: Cancel, Capture Image, Control, Drop Down Menus, Improvements, Keyboard, Laptop, Menus, New Features, Screen Buttons, Simple Solution, snipping tool, Windows Vista

Comments

  1. web consultancy says

    August 27, 2009 at 12:32 pm

    nice tips men! vista is very complicated and their only few people can used it to the fullest..

    Reply
  2. Christie says

    August 27, 2009 at 3:14 pm

    Oh you JUST saved me the price of SnagIT! Seriously – I got so frustrated with not being able to get the dropdown menu that I downloaded the SnagIT eval this past weekend. Thanks so much!
    .-= Christie´s last blog ..Thesis Theme discount – some things to watch out for! =-.

    Reply
    • Robert Owen says

      August 27, 2009 at 4:03 pm

      It’s really a pretty good little utility. Still probably wont do everything that programs like snagIT will do but I find it gets the job done. Especially since I figured out this little piece! 🙂

      Reply
  3. felch says

    August 27, 2009 at 10:08 pm

    Why not just print screen and cut the jpeg from paint ?

    Reply
    • Robert Owen says

      August 27, 2009 at 11:58 pm

      Well, you could do that… But this was about using the utility supplied to accomplish the task. 😉

      Reply
  4. Christie says

    March 4, 2010 at 9:26 am

    Oh wow you saved me again! I was trying to capture a dropdown list of user attributes from SharePoint – and I didn’t see any way to “delay” capture in Snipping Tool but my old brain remembered that you had given us a trick. Thanks again!

    Reply
    • Robert Owen says

      March 4, 2010 at 4:01 pm

      No Problem! Glad it helps! 🙂

      Reply
  5. Barclay says

    March 31, 2010 at 11:32 am

    Awesome thanks, have always been looking for a way to capture menu’s easily…

    Reply
  6. Rob says

    August 27, 2012 at 12:46 pm

    Just an added note for LAPTOP users (since it seems to be a common stumbling block)…
    The PrtScn key is only accessible by first pressing (and holding) the Fn or Function key – note that both of these keys are prob blue text – indicating that the Fn key is req’d.
    So…. to accomplish Ctrl+PrtScn on a laptop, you must actually press Ctrl+Fn+PrtScn

    hope this helps

    Reply
  7. Roger says

    April 30, 2013 at 2:13 pm

    Thanks for the great tip. I’ve been using the PrtScn-paste-to-Paint-and-crop technique but this is a good time saver!

    Reply
  8. pkl says

    July 8, 2013 at 12:43 am

    Thanks. Simple things are difficult if you don’t know!

    Reply
  9. nav says

    November 21, 2013 at 11:23 pm

    Thank you very much helped a lot

    Reply
  10. Hasan says

    February 27, 2014 at 2:31 am

    This was pretty useful thanks a lot 🙂

    Reply
  11. Ed says

    April 20, 2014 at 11:50 am

    Muchas gracias!

    Reply
  12. payam says

    July 30, 2014 at 8:45 am

    thanks , helped me.

    Reply
  13. shannon says

    October 10, 2014 at 4:03 pm

    Thank you!!!!!! Not being able to snip a menu was driving me bonkers! Thank you!!!

    Reply
  14. Coeur says

    December 25, 2014 at 6:38 pm

    I do not have PrintScreen key on my keyboard (Macbook). Any possibility to snip a menu without it?

    Reply
    • Robert Owen says

      January 5, 2015 at 6:16 pm

      I will look into it.

      Reply
    • Robert Owen says

      January 5, 2015 at 6:20 pm

      If you have an F14 key, try that.

      Reply
  15. Ilco says

    January 26, 2015 at 8:47 am

    Awsome, man! I knew it existed!

    Reply
  16. Kevin says

    January 29, 2015 at 12:24 pm

    Thank you for this post!!!!!!!!!!!! I was about to freaking pull my hair out with the stupid menu disappearing every time I opened up the snipping tool.

    Reply
  17. Paul says

    April 8, 2015 at 11:07 am

    Excellent!

    Reply
  18. Mary says

    April 22, 2015 at 1:59 pm

    Excellent and very useful tip. Thanks so much !

    Reply
  19. Stuart McMinn says

    September 18, 2015 at 2:18 am

    Great tip! Still works in Windows 10 and as an added bonus, Windows 10 version of Snipping Tool has a Delay menu option allowing a delay of 0 (default on startup) to 5 seconds staying at the last setting until reset to another value.

    Reply
  20. Microsoft fan says

    November 3, 2015 at 4:10 pm

    Great tip!

    I also found a video on YouTube showing us how to do that –

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEOvvLPhNSc

    As I notice, on some laptops/PCs, we have to press “Ctrl + Fn + Prt Sc” instead of “Ctrl + Prt Sc”
    Hope this helps!

    Reply
  21. Rick says

    April 4, 2016 at 11:48 am

    You sir…are a genius! Thanks a million.

    Reply
  22. Param says

    May 3, 2016 at 11:43 pm

    Dear Robert Owen,
    That tip was Awesome, I was using the round about way, capture the whole screen then crop the area I need, most of the time the image was dull.

    This great tip saved a lot of time and the clarity is not lost as well.

    THANKS A LOT

    Reply
  23. Bukky Onyekwelu says

    June 1, 2016 at 4:02 am

    Thanks.This really worked
    I was preparing a training manual and needed to capture drop downs.

    Though I tried the full print screen and crop option but this is way better.

    Thanks again

    Reply
  24. Mike says

    June 30, 2016 at 11:00 am

    Thank you very much for this tip! It works perfectly! I really missed this functionality on my work PC as it’s still Windows 7. My home PC is 10 and has the delay built in. So this is a HUGE help for me!

    Reply
  25. Gina says

    August 10, 2016 at 12:22 pm

    Thank you so much for this information! I’m in the middle of a project and thought I’d hit a wall. In desperation I searched “how to” and this came up. Two minutes later I’m back in business. Thank you!!

    Reply
  26. David Russell says

    August 23, 2016 at 2:21 pm

    Still very valid information in 2016. Thank you. I use “Cntl PrintScr” so seldom, it seems I mostly forget how to do it. It’s nice that you’ve captured and published this. Thank you.

    Reply
  27. Rick T says

    October 6, 2016 at 5:53 pm

    Still works in Windows 10 ! Very helpfull.

    Reply
  28. Ozzi Neseli says

    October 19, 2016 at 5:11 am

    So cool. Thank you very very much.

    Reply
  29. Marvin says

    December 7, 2016 at 1:28 pm

    Bless you!

    Reply
  30. Joan Baum says

    March 19, 2017 at 11:17 pm

    FAnnnntastic…! I have been looking for a way to do this for ages. I create Training Info and Handouts and have needed this many times! Terrific!!! Thanks… JB

    Reply
  31. Vijay says

    May 19, 2017 at 5:55 pm

    Great Tip. I was searching it since long. Thank you.

    Reply
  32. Gina Burchard says

    May 23, 2017 at 3:00 pm

    Doesn’t work with Windows 2010.

    Reply
    • Eric Searing says

      August 8, 2017 at 10:03 am

      You have to paste the clipboard capture (Screen print) into a document (excel/word/pdf/other)- then you can use snipping tool to capture only the area you want.

      Reply
    • Raymond says

      November 10, 2017 at 7:26 am

      It works for me on Windows 10.

      Reply
  33. Leisha Wharfield says

    July 5, 2017 at 8:08 pm

    Works on my Windows 10 Pro 64-bit OS.

    + I love you, thank you!

    Reply
  34. Jeff says

    July 25, 2017 at 5:27 pm

    This made my day today!

    Reply
  35. Dennis says

    October 9, 2017 at 2:54 pm

    How do you prevent picture taken with ‘Snipping Tool” from disappear after a certain time?

    Reply
  36. Casey says

    November 30, 2017 at 9:58 am

    Thank you!! Just spent 15 minutes trying to find the answer to this and no one knew! Great tip!

    Reply
  37. Ann Marie Andrews says

    March 1, 2018 at 6:35 pm

    This seems to be working for everyone but me! I have tried the Fn, Ctrl, PrtSc and just Ctrl, PrtSc and it will not work. I have no hair left as I have pulled it all out, can someone please tell me what I am doing wrong?
    Thanks 🙂

    Reply
  38. Michael says

    April 26, 2018 at 7:09 am

    Great solution. Thanks!

    Reply
  39. Nicole Larkin says

    May 18, 2018 at 7:14 pm

    Nine years later and your post is still helpful. Thank you!

    Reply
  40. Sue K says

    March 4, 2019 at 9:13 am

    Thanks you so much! I could never figure out how to take a pic with a dropdown menu! Now I’ve learned how! I have to write down that little gem!

    Reply

Trackbacks

  1. Cool bytes from around the internet says:
    September 5, 2009 at 2:28 pm

    […] Use the Snipping Tool to Capture Menus This one saved me from buying SnagIt! […]

    Reply
  2. 1314.12 Weekly Report ^ | My Portfolio says:
    November 6, 2013 at 12:02 pm

    […] about the snipping tool today and that is how to take a pic with a dropdown menu open. Here is the website that tells you […]

    Reply

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Robert Owen A Horn Player turned salesman, turned Computer Consultant & Horn Player, Turn Network Engineer & Horn Player.... Well, How about a Horn player who does a lot of other stuff? More about me. FacebookInstagramLinkedInTwitter

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