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Windows Explorer - Clear File Explorer History, does not clear history

Anonymous
2023-12-19T05:25:23+00:00

In Windows 11 Enterprise Edition when going to:

Win+E

Three Dots

Options

Tab "General"

Section "Privacy"

Button "Clear"

The expectation is that using the Clear button will erase all File Explorer History. However when pressing the Clear button nothing is being erased and all files in the sections for "Recommended" and "Recent" is still there.

Any tips how to fix this?

Windows for home | Windows 11 | Files, folders, and storage

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

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  1. Miguel Molina O 5,780 Reputation points Independent Advisor
    2023-12-19T06:31:02+00:00

    Hi, and thanks for reaching out. My name is Miguel O., Sorry to hear you're experiencing this issue!

    One solution to that is:

    1. Open Regedit.exe
    2. Expand the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE node
    3. Navigate to SOFTWARE \ MICROSOFT \ WINDOWS SEARCH
    4. On the right-hand side of the screen, you should see a REG_SZ value named “SetupCompletedSuccessfully” which normally is set to a value of “1”.
    5. Double-click on the value and change it to 0.
    6. Restart the Windows Search service (either using the Services control panel, or the command line “net stop wsearch” followed by “net start wsearch”)

    This will result in a rebuild of your index and will also reset your crawl scopes (folders to be indexed). It may also reset certain Indexing-related settings.

    If you have any trouble following any steps or the issue persists let me know!

    Give back to the Community. Help the next person who has this issue by indicating if this reply solved your problem. Click Yes or No below.

    2 people found this answer helpful.
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  2. Miguel Molina O 5,780 Reputation points Independent Advisor
    2023-12-20T03:41:29+00:00

    you can send feedback directly to Microsoft to improve this navigation feature in future updates, to do that you can use the Microsoft feedback portal:

    https://feedbackportal.microsoft.com/feedback/

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  3. Anonymous
    2023-12-20T00:26:36+00:00

    Hi Miguel, appreciate your response again. I tried step 1 and 2 from the link but same issue step 1 doesn't work and step 2 is what I described in my original post. As far as I can tell this is a MS product issue and should be fixed by MS. Any idea how to report this to MS?

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  4. Miguel Molina O 5,780 Reputation points Independent Advisor
    2023-12-19T23:43:03+00:00

    Please try doing the fixes on the link below:

    https://www.elevenforum.com/t/clear-file-explor...

    Note: This is a non-Microsoft website. The page appears to be providing accurate, safe information. Watch out for ads on the site that may advertise products frequently classified as a PUP (Potentially Unwanted Products). Thoroughly research any product advertised on the site before you decide to download and install it.

    If your problem persists or the problem is fixed please keep me posted!

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  5. Anonymous
    2023-12-19T22:53:52+00:00

    Hello Miguel,

    Thanks for your response. I followed the steps, however this did not solve the original problem.

    Also in your step #4 you mentioned SetupCompletedSuccessfully with value REG_SZ, but there was no such combination. Only SetupCompletedSuccessfully with value REG_DWORD. I used this entry to proceed with step #5-6.

    After that I restarted the laptop and let it run in case it had to rebuild the indexes. The next morning I checked my original steps and it still would not clear the history.

    Regards, Andre

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