Looking at the crudeness of the Icon, (and it’s supporting “thrown in” code), it looks like it was a temporary tool, that somehow made it into the Patch, or it is a work in Progress, and would be replaced by a better Icon, and more integrated code that would support being able to hide it – like the other Icons in that menu.
Come on, an UGLY icon is the least of the problems that the code base has at the moment !!
It’s a stupid and unnecessary feature - REMOVE IT.
Simply implement PAUSE like it existed in previous versions.
That way - you can fix your approach settings as required, read bush trip nav tips, take drone screenshots, etc.
There is not a single post in this thread that explains what usefulness “Active Pause” fills in any way.
The problem is that “PAUSE” (which you need to manually bind) doesn’t allow you to change switches etc while in pause - that’s not how it should work.
Step 1: Fix “PAUSE”
Step 2: Completely remove “Active Pause”
It does actually, at least up to a point. Glass cockpit displays etc work fine. Other buttons can be pressed too, but don’t change position or register until you unpause. Nonetheless it does work.
See a couple of other posts on this topic:
Yes that’s true.
But if they fix that (so that you can actively throw switches, program the FMS, etc) - then regular PAUSE (Set Pause On/Off) is perfect - and “Active Pause” can be removed.
And everything will be right with the world 
I currently cannot get active pause to turn off. I’m flying the 320 and had my smartcars set to pause at TOD. Came back to my computer, turned off active pause and did nothing. I also went in to my keyboard assignments and set “set pause on/off” keys to no avail. I can’t stand this feature. A normal pause like in any other simulator would be fine! so now i’m stuck at FL350…lol
Leave it on for a while and let your airspeed start to decay, then see how it goes…
Just had this adventure as well. Flying a King Air, doing like 200 canots, straight and level and with AP on. Kicked in the active pause because I had to, and I knew the speeds would change. Weird thing is even with full throttle I could hardly get it past 100kts anymore and after unpausing the plane was totally out of control due to the AP thing I didn’t know until I read here. That flight was unrecoverable to say the least.
The real fun now is that when I just use ESC to pause with the menu, the sim literally makes my GPU melt (temps rise quickly and fan spools up to 100% in no time) and I don’t know why. I know lots of (mostly older) games that do this and I wonder why that particular issue is still around nowadays. That’s why I don’t ESC. Probably just bad programming… older games tend to render at 1k + fps when doing that, but FS doesn’t. Is at around 120 then. I once had a passively cooled Radeon 3870 that had 40° on idle, 60° on load and would raise up to ~130° until everything froze in a few game menus. Ridiculous to see that happen here as well.
If you limit fps to e.g. 60, temps and fan RPM will noticeable decrease with the ‘real’ ESC pause.
and why cant i switch it off with custom toolbar like all the others ???
Has this been acknowledged as a bug? I had this happen today in the Diamond when I had to pause the sim on approach because of the work related call I needed to take. No way to recover from the trim up.
Its not a bug, it’s how “active pause” works (which is poor design IMO). Basically the plane stops visually only, everything else keeps going. It’s something to be avoided. You can bind “Set Pause On” and “Set Pause Off” commands to a couple of keys and then get a pause that is what you expect.
Turn off auto-pilot, turn on active pause.
Once done with active pause, turn it off, and then turn on auto-pilot.
I use active pause a bit so i can look around and get screenshots if worthy, and that generally works for me.
No need to turn off the AP if you use “Set Pause On” and “Set Pause off”. 
You can bind these commands to key strokes or buttons. I have “on” bound to the P key and “off” bound to the “[” key
Yeah this almost seems like a last-minute thought to throw it into the game. I’m all for improvements to the game but it seems like this one skipped out on QA
More than the looks, it’s functionality is what makes no sense. I’ve used it three times between 10 to 25 seconds with the same effect every time. It caused the plane to stall, or the auto pilot to go crazy and killed everybody on board. A pause should stop (freeze) everything, that’s what I think. So when I have to pause, I go ESC and use RESUME do get back where I left.
I had the same experience, @Zzyzxuk had the same experience, @[Zzyzxuk] I also was watching tutorial videos about the G1000, did active pause to review the flight plan, and afterwards, to my shock, the plane started a nosedive, the plane was at 2,000 feet. No chance to recover. Microsoft, please fix this.
Active pause is for adjustments (with mouse and keyboard) so your plane stays still.
Use pause instead.
If you haven’t done it already, you should assign keys for pause ON and pause OFF.
Hello @anon63481597, I am using it for adjustments, I usually use Esc if I’m going to get to move away from the PC. I observed that the plane was still shaking.
Ok… I though you were using active pause while doing other things, like watching tutorial videos etc…
You know, there are 3 different pauses?
Active pause doesn’t actually pause anything. It just keeps your plane still, but everything else keeps on going, like autopilot…
3 different pauses? I’m only aware of two:- Active pause, and escape (Esc)
Can you describe the other one and suggest which option would be best used to update the aircraft equipment/knobs while in flight, as it’s too bumpy when using the mouse