I’m confused about my Windows 10 system: some folders I view have icons, while others are shown as a list. How can I change my File Explorer view?
This is a great example of “everyone’s different” in terms of how they like to view their files and folders. Some people like big, cheery icons while others want just the details and don’t really care about the icons or little pictures associated with individual files, documents, spreadsheets, photos or folders. Fortunately, Microsoft Windows has always supported a variety of different folder views within File Explorer.
As File Explorer has evolved through the many generations of Windows, it’s important to note that the design now ends up looking rather like the tools in Microsoft Office with a toolbar “ribbon”, which can be a bit disconcerting if you’re used to the old school Windows interface. Oh, and there are two places you can change the view of a folder too, as we’ll see.
To start, here’s the default view I see when I open up a new instance of File Explorer on my own Win10 system:
A navigator box on the left, files and folders shown with small icons on the right, and the “File” tools chosen on the very top.
But look closely on the bottom right corner of this window. There are two little view icons. Let’s see what they do!
First, I’ll click on the tiny picture on the very bottom right edge…
Ah, okay, that’s “icons only” view. What about the tiny button adjacent on the lower right corner?
A click and…
Those are three of the most common views, but if you look along the top menu, you’ll see that one of the choices is “View“. A click on it and you’ll see that there are a lot of different view options:
In fact, as you move your cursor over the different options, the view changes. In the above, you can see that this is “Small icons” view, different from any of the previous views.
Notice also on the left of the View ribbon the option “Navigation pane“. Adjacent to it are two tiny three column boxes with the third column blue. That lets you add a Preview pane to the window too, as shown here:
This can be useful if you want to peek into photo files to see what the image is, but lots of people disable this: just choose the same option again from the View ribbon and it’ll go away again.
But there are more options. Click on “Show/hide” and you’ll see you can get rid of things like those pesky check boxes:
And then there are “Options“, while we’re at it:
Turns out that it just has the one option “Change folder and search options” but it’s quite a complicated window that shows up as you can see:
That’s just the General tab, too. Click on View and you’ll see you can change those settings too (and these changes tend to be for all File Explorer windows, not just the current folder window you’re viewing).
Not enough options?
Seriously, how can that not be enough options? It’s incredibly detailed! But…
Okay, more options. Click on “Search” along the tab bar:
That’s it. No more options.
Now you know all the ways you can modify or customize exactly what you see in an individual File Explorer window in Windows 10 or across all your file windows as you move around in your Windows 10 system. Good luck!
Hi
A few versions ago windows explorer allowed group by name in alphabetical order for each letter now its just in a-h I-p q-z groups
is there a way windows 10 can be set to individual letters again
I liked the divisions for my sub folders
thanks
Pjungwirth@telus.net (Peter)