Unable to delete thumbs.db

Anonymous
2023-03-22T08:55:44+00:00

I'm on the newest Win10 and am looking for a way to delete folders which only contain one file, the thumbs.db, and nothing else.

I've read several things in this thread (which is now closed) where some didn't help and others were too painful to be even tried (why should i have to boot in safe mode?).

Is there a easy way to delete those folders?

I'm often succeeding with restarting explorer.exe from the taskmanager's app tab (wondering why explorer.exe is the only process offering "restart" in its context menu) and then being quick enough to delete such folders before explorer grabs em again. But there are always some hard ones which somehow escape this hack.

For such the only working thing i know of is to actually end all explorer.exe processes, delete the folder from a cmd line with rmdir /S/Q "foldername" and restart explorer.exe. But both approaches are a pain because usually i have many explorer.exe windows open an don't like to restore them all manually because that's a waste of time.

Is there a proper way to delete those folders which doesn't involve hacking the registry, changing system wide settings, booting from a linux live cd or killing explorer.exe? After all their empty so i don't understand why there's the need to hold on to a thumbs.db which by then shouldn't contain any thumbs. Maybe there's a purge-unused-thumbs option somewhere?

Windows for home | Windows 10 | Files, folders, and storage

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  1. Anonymous
    2025-06-24T05:59:18+00:00

    Having read this full thread, the only way I managed to get rid of thumbs.db is by using 7-Zip and choosing the "Delete files after compression" option.

    If you find this helpful please give it a YES vote below👍

    It is a corporate (locked down) Win11 PC and I've tried the following before 7-Zip...

    • I can't rename it (file is in use)
    • I can edit it, but can't save it (file is in use)
    • I can't Move the folder somewhere else (file is in use)
    • I can't run Resource Monitor (needs administrator access)
    • I can't start in Safe Mode
    • I tried Always show as icons, never thumbails on/off
    • I tried Display file icon on thumbnails on/off
    • I tried the restarting Explorer trick but that didn't work
    • The folder name(s) do not contain "Photo" / "Pictures" / "Video" / "Media", etc.

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  2. Anonymous
    2025-04-17T14:48:04+00:00

    OK, I am not going through 6 pages on this, but here is what I tried and it worked.

    On my company's drive I had two folders that I could not get rid of because of Thumbs.db. I have no real Admin rights, so some of the solutions given were not available.

    I tried renaming it, and I could, but I still could not delete it.

    What DID work was taking the directory, right-click dragging it over to my desktop and selecting "move". I then selected it (I did not open it) and I was able to delete it.

    One note, however. I did rename it before moving, so I don't know if that is needed or not.

    This is similar to trying to detach attachments in mail, but the saved mail is still large. If I remember it correctly, save the mail to desktop, remove the attachments, save again, change the name and then "save as" somewhere else.

    I would have to go through the permutations of that to see if renaming it AND saving as are both needed, but this has worked to bring some 20M mailings down to a few KB.

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  3. Anonymous
    2023-10-31T08:24:28+00:00

    Another solution is to use WinRar.
    In WinRar you have the option to delete files when archiving.
    So you'd simply create an archive of the file or folder and then delete the rar file afterwards.
    Sometimes this works...

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  4. Anonymous
    2023-03-23T04:52:44+00:00

    Hi ,

    Sabya here, Independent Windows Adviser. Hope you are doing well.

    Most of the time a simple restart fixes the issue with me. However when the restart fails I try the clean boot / Safe mode

    https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/how-t...

    The file is being used by the system so it cannot be removed at that instant of time.

    My pleasure to assist you.

    If you have other issues or concerns that I might help you with, don't hesitate to ask.

    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 the reply that helped you.

    Regards,

    Sabya

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  5. Anonymous
    2023-03-22T14:47:49+00:00

    Try to clear the thumbnails and then restart the computer. Once booted, check if the problem persists. See if that works

    https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/5655-clear-...

    (Disclaimer: 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 PUP (Potentially Unwanted Products). Thoroughly research any product advertised on the site before you decide to download and install it.)

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