Unable to open programs or files without choosing Run as Administrator

Question

All of a sudden many of my application shortcuts, whether from the Start Menu, from File Explorer, or from the desktop, will only run when I right click on them and choose to Run as Administrator. Other shortcuts run just fine. For the ones that require Run as Administrator, if I open File Explorer and double click on the application itself instead of through a shortcut, I still must choose Run as Administrator to get it to work. I have tried creating new shortcuts but that doesn't help.

Document files with shortcuts do not work at all, whether from the desktop or from File Explorer. Double clicking on the document itself, or right clicking and choosing run or run with does not work either. If I open either the spreadsheet or the work processor application first, I can open the document just fine, whether by clicking on the recent document icon for the file or by opening File Explorer through the application. I am running Windows 11 Pro 23H2, latest update, on an MSI GS76 Stealth laptop with an Intel i9 processor with 16 cores and 32 GB of memory.

Can anyone help?

Answer 1

Hello,

Have we made any modifications to the machine before? Is this a domain environment?

To verify whehther the issue is related to the specific account, we may try to create a new administrator account then login with this new administrator account.

It could be related to the UAC settings. If we don't want to choose run as administrator all the time, we may try to disable UAC reboot then check it again. Please note disabling UAC may lower the security of the machine.

All the programs may run as administrator by default.