Starting with the Windows 10 Insider Preview Build 14971, Microsoft has replaced the classic Paint app with the new Paint3D Preview app. Paint3D Preview app was recently introduced during the Microsoft Devices event in October, and is shipping with the Creators update which is set to land sometime early 2017.
A lot of users have reported the new refreshed app as buggy and non-polished, and far from being stable than the old Paint app, which comes in very handy for minor operations like cropping, resizing, shape drawing etc.
But, the old paint app has not gone all together, it is still hidden somewhere in the system files.
Here is how to back the Classic paint app:
- Click on Start and type regedit.exe , this will show up Registry Editor in search results, Open it.
- Go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Applets\Paint\Settings or
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Applets\Paint\Settings - Â In the right-pane, create a DWORD value named DisableModernPaintBootstrap
- Double-click DisableModernPaintBootstrap and set its value to 1
- You are done! Â Exit the Registry Editor.
- Hit start and type mspaint.exe  which shows up the classic Microsoft Paint application in search results. Run it and Enjoy!
If you are not comfortable with Registry Editor, there is a simple way to automate the steps.
Unzip and run the enclosed REG file. That’s it. Start mspaint.exe and you are good to go.
Give it a try and let us know what you think in the comments below.
