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How to Restore Thumbnails in Windows 10 in 6 Quick Steps

5 min. read

Updated onMarch 5, 2024

updated onMarch 5, 2024

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Resetting or restoringthumbnailsinWindows 10is something that users tend to do on their computers, almost now and then. This happens if the icons and/orthumbnailsare in some way corrupted such thatthey are blankor have been taken over by other apps, or they’re just not being displayed as they should in a normal situation.

In this case, restoring thethumbnailsby resetting theiconcache can help resolve the issue. The same goes also forthumbnailcache, which is usually used to keep image previews, as well as previews of videos and documents.

Windows 10usually keeps a cache database that housesthumbnailimages for each folder, document, video, and photo on your computer system, which is used to display a preview of the file quickly or help you see the contents of a folder before opening it.

This problem grows over time as more folders and files are created, so the database can get corrupted, which manifests as the File Explorer displays incorrectthumbnailsthe files don’t show previews of the same, or they could just not be there at all.

Thankfully, there are several solutions you can use to restorethumbnailsinWindows 10as listed below.

How to restore thumbnails in Windows 10?

1. Use Disk Cleanup

2. Using an elevated Command Prompt

If you try using the disk cleanup tool and it doesn’t work to restore thumbnails inWindows 10, try using command lines from the elevated Command Prompt option. To do this:

Type the following command to delete all the thumbnail database files without asking for confirmation:del /f /s /q /a %LocalAppData%MicrosoftWindowsExplorerthumbcache_*.db

Your files and folders should be able to have thumbnail previews showing up properly now.

3. Check folder settings

If you still cannot restore thumbnails inWindows 10, someone may have interfered with your folder settings. In this case, do the following to fix it:

Your files and folders should be able to have thumbnail previews showing up properly now.

4. Use the Run command

To do this:

5. Use Control Panel

6. Reset and rebuild thumbnail cache

To do this, start by resetting and then rebuild the cache as outlined below:

Reset cache:

Rebuild cache

Were you able to restore thumbnails inWindows 10using the solutions above? Let us know in the comments section below.

Thumbnail issues can appear in Chrome as well, but you canlearn how to bring back Google thumbnails effortlesslyfrom one of our other guides.

Did you manage to fix this problem? Let us know in the comments.

How to Restore Thumbnails in Windows 10 in 6 Quick Steps#

How to restore thumbnails in Windows 10?#

1. Use Disk Cleanup#

2. Using an elevated Command Prompt#

3. Check folder settings#

4. Use the Run command#

5. Use Control Panel#

6. Reset and rebuild thumbnail cache#