How To Switch To A New Desktop Background Using A Hotkey In Windows 7 & 8

The themes in Windows 7 and Windows 8 usually contains a number of images in each theme. Other elements remain the same, but the image changes to a new one after a specified amount of time. This time interval can be changed by opening Personalization settings and selecting the Desktop Background option. The time interval can be set from 10 seconds to one day depending on the user’s preference. If you are fond of using a large collection of wallpapers, you can set a lower time interval. However, having a large collection means that sometimes, an image may appear on your background that might not be according to your mood at the time and you might want to change it. By default, the desktop context menu of Windows 7 and Windows 8 contains an option called Switch To next Desktop Background, which – as the name suggests – allows you to switch to the next desktop background available in the image list. In this post, we will show you how to switch to the next desktop background using a keyboard shortcut rather than accessing the right click context menu of Windows desktop. Read on to find out how.

First, open a blank Notepad document and paste the following code in it.

set WshShell = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
 WshShell.SendKeys("^ ")
 WshShell.SendKeys("+{F10}")
 WshShell.SendKeys("n")

Next, save the file with any name of your choice, however, it must be saved with the VBS extension. For instance, you can name it NextDesktopBG.vbs. Double-clicking this file will change the desktop background to the next one in the image list.

Note: By default, Windows has extensions set to hidden for known file types, and that prevents users from changing them directly. To show extensions for all file types, just follow our quick guide.

Right-click the file and select Create Shortcut from the context menu to place a shortcut of the file on your desktop.

Now, right-click the shortcut and open its Properties. Under the Shortcut tab, select a custom shortcut key in front of the Short key field. Click OK to apply the new hotkey.

Now you can easily switch to the next desktop background using a hotkey!