Apps Open and Close Panes in Windows Terminal in Windows 11

This tutorial will show you how to open and close panes in Windows Terminal for your account in Windows 10 and Windows 11.

Windows Terminal is a modern host application for the command-line shells you already love, like Command Prompt, PowerShell, and bash (via Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL)). Its main features include multiple tabs, panes, Unicode and UTF-8 character support, a GPU accelerated text rendering engine, and the ability to create your own themes and customize text, colors, backgrounds, and shortcuts.

Panes give you the ability to run multiple command-line applications next to each other within the same tab. This minimizes the need to switch between tabs and lets you see multiple prompts at once.

You can either create a new vertical or horizontal pane in Windows Terminal. Splitting vertically will open a new pane to the right of the focused pane and splitting horizontally will open a new pane below the focused pane.

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EXAMPLE: Windows Terminal panes







1 In Windows Terminal, click/tap on the pane you want in focus (active) to create a new pane horizontally (below) or vertically (right) from. (see screenshot below)


2 Perform one of the following actions for what you want: (see screenshots below)

• To create a new vertical pane of your default profile to the right of the focused pane, press the Alt+Shift++ keys.
• To create a new horizontal pane of your default profile below the focused pane, press the Alt+Shift+- keys.

1 In Windows Terminal, click/tap on the down arrow button on the top bar to open the dropdown menu. (see screenshot below)

2 Press and hold the Alt key, and click/tap on the profile (ex: "Command Prompt") you want to open as a new pane in this tab, and release the Alt key.

3 This will auto split the active window or pane into a new pane of the selected profile. The auto split mode splits in the direction that has the longest edge to create a pane.







1 In Windows Terminal, press and hold the Alt key, click/tap on the New tab (+) button on the top bar, and release the Alt key. (see screenshot below)


2 This will auto split the active window or pane into a new pane of your default profile. The auto split mode splits in the direction that has the longest edge to create a pane.






1 In Windows Terminal, right click on a tab you want to split, and click/tap on Split Tab. (see screenshots below)

2 This will duplicate the focused pane in the current tab.








1 In Windows Terminal, click/tap on the pane you want to close to bring it into focus (active). (see screenshots below)

2 Press the Ctrl+Shift+W keys to close the active pane.

Closing a tab will close all panes in the tab.

That's it,
Shawn Brink