How to Implement Effective Splash Screens in Windows Forms Applications?

Implementing a splash screen in a Windows Forms application

Many applications need to display a temporary welcome screen during startup. In Windows Forms applications, splash screens provide this functionality. Understanding how to create and implement them can enhance the user experience and convey important application information.

Create splash screen

First design a borderless and immovable form. Place the desired image on the form and center it on the screen. To do this:

• Set the ControlBox, MaximizeBox, MinimizeBox and ShowIcon properties to "False".
• Set the StartPosition property to "CenterScreen".
• Set the FormBorderStyle property to "None".
• Set the form's MinimumSize and MaximumSize to match its initial size.

Show and close splash screen

The splash screen should be displayed during the initialization process of the application. Determine an appropriate place to display it, such as your main() routine or the Load handler of the main application form.

Create an instance of the splash screen form, display it using the Show() method, and retain a reference to it when the application is initialized. Once your main application form is ready, use the Close() method to close the splash screen form.

Other considerations for animated splash screens

If your splash screen requires animated images, you must enable double buffering of the form and ensure that all initialization logic is executed outside the GUI thread.

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