user behavior - How should a minimize-to-tray application behave?

I am building an application that minimizes to tray on the close-button (cross upper right corner). I found two different behaviours for this kind of application now:

1. click on the tray icon to bring the application back to front again, and not use a ContextMenu.


2. use a ContextMenu with a "Show Application" option (plus Quit and some control actions).

The first one is obviously the easiest to implement, but what is the way to go for "least surprise" ?

Answer

This really depends on the usage behavior of your app.

If you're able to provide some direct helpful actions in the "ContextMenu" then please use a contextmenu on click. So the user is able to interact with your app without opening it (= fast access). Best example would be the power mode of Windows 8.1, see screenshot.

Here is the Windows 10 screenshot.

If you're just showing some options (like "Open"/"Settings"/"Quit"..) then please always open the open on a click. Implement a right-click behavior to open the ContextMenu. It is really destracting if you would like to open an app and you always need to click twice (Click on tray icon -> Click on open app).