Is your desktop a cluttered mess of shortcuts, files and folders? If you can never quite find the time to clear it up, then you might appreciate AutoHideDesktopIcons, a free tool which hides any desktop icons until you need them.

The program is portable, no installation required; just run it, click “To-Tray”, and wait. Within five seconds your desktop icons will vanish. When you need them, left click the desktop and they’ll return. Easy.

There are some useful settings, too. Check “Start with Windows” and “Hide icons at program start” to keep your desktop junk permanently out of sight. And you can set the timer to whatever delay you’d like before the desktop icons disappear (anything from 3 to 100 seconds).

The program can also hide the taskbar along with your desktop icons. The effect is similar to the standard auto-hide option (right-click the taskbar, select Properties, check “Auto-hide”), but perhaps a little less distracting as the taskbar doesn’t disappear immediately.

Put it all together and AutoHideDesktopIcons works very well. It’s a simple idea, but well implemented, and a great way to keep you desktop clutter out of sight.