How to open your user profile folder in Windows

In Windows, your user profile folder is a special folder containing files and folders pertaining only to you. It contains your Desktop, your Documents, and personal data such as your application preferences.

Files in the user profile folder are private to you. If other people use your computer, they cannot view and change the files in your user profile folder, unless they are an administrator. The same permissions apply to all subdirectories of your profile directory, such as your Desktop directory, your Documents directory, etc.

Where is the user profile folder?

Your user profile folder is located in the Users folder on your Windows system drive, which on most computers is C:.

In the Users folder, your profile folder name is the same as your username. If your username is hope, your user profile folder is located at C:\Users\hope\.

The %USERPROFILE% environment variable

If you’re not sure what your username is, you can always get to your profile folder using the environment variable %USERPROFILE%.

An environment variable is a special word containing a value. The %USERPROFILE% variable contains the path of your user profile folder.

Using %USERPROFILE% in File Explorer

In your File Explorer, the location bar shows the name of the folder you’re viewing. It works like an address bar in a web browser. You can type a location on your computer into the location bar, and File Explorer opens that folder.

As shown in the following steps, if you type %USERPROFILE% in the location bar, File Explorer opens your profile folder.

Open a new File Explorer window. You can open it from the Start menu (Windows System → File Explorer).

Or, press the keyboard shortcut Windows key + E (hold down the Windows key and press E).

Click in the location bar.

Type %USERPROFILE% and press Enter .

1. File Explorer opens your user profile folder and displays its contents. The title bar of the window and your location bar both display your full login name.

Using %USERPROFILE% in Command Prompt

If you use the Windows Command Prompt, you can use the cd command with %USERPROFILE% to change the current directory to your profile folder.

1. Open the Command Prompt. For example, press Windows key + R to open the run box, then type cmd and press Enter .

1. Your command prompt displays the current directory, followed by a >.

By default, when you open a new Command Prompt window, the current directory is your user profile folder.

1. To change to your profile folder at any time, use the cd command:

1. You can also use the echo command to display the value of %USERPROFILE%.

To view your username, use echo %USERNAME%.

For more information about environment variables, see: What are the default environment variables in Windows?

Why do I need to open the profile folder?

Usually, you don’t need to open your profile folder directly. The Quick Access shortcuts on the left side of the File Explorer window (Desktop, Documents, Downloads, Music, etc.) already point to the major folders in your profile directory.

As a general rule, you should not rearrange the files and folders that already exist in your profile directory, because Windows expects them to have certain names and locations. For instance, do not move or rename your Desktop folder.

However, you can put files and folders in your profile directory if you choose.

Also, some tasks, such as adding items to your Startup folder, require you know the location of your profile folder.

Change the default location of %USERPROFILE%. Move user profile folders to d:\users

Hi, we would like a way to change the default location of the user profile folder in windows 7. Is there any way to do it after the OS is installed? We would really like to avoid using sysprep for this.

We tried changing the following registry keys without success:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ Software \ Microsoft \ Windows \ CurrentVersion \ Explorer \ User Shell Folders

Any help is appreciated.

Hi, we would like a way to change the default location of the user profile folder in windows 7. Is there any way to do it after the OS is installed? We would really like to avoid using sysprep for this.

We tried changing the following registry keys without success:

Any help is appreciated.

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ Software \ Microsoft \ Windows \ CurrentVersion \ Explorer \ User Shell Folders

There is no supported way to accomplish this after the system is already installed. The only supported scenario is to use the WAIK and Sysprep to create an image for deployment.

If you attempt to move an entire users profile folder to another partition or drive, this will introduce problems that will result in a less than acceptable user experience.

If your focus is on reducing the disk space used by the users folders, since the bulk (usually over 90%) of any User profile is contained in the common data folders, such as My Documents, My Music, My Pictures, and My Videos, all of these folders have a Location Tab in the folders Properties that make it very easy to move all of this data to a remote drive or partition.

Other disk space hogs, such as Email Client programs and other programs that create a huge amount of data will usually have an option available that allow the user to easily store all of this data on a remote drive.

Here are a few links to other threads discussing this issue.

About User Profiles

The system creates a user profile the first time that a user logs on to a computer. At subsequent logons, the system loads the user’s profile, and then other system components configure the user’s environment according to the information in the profile.

Types of User Profiles

• Local User Profiles. A local user profile is created the first time that a user logs on to a computer. The profile is stored on the computer’s local hard disk. Changes made to the local user profile are specific to the user and to the computer on which the changes are made.
• Roaming User Profiles. A roaming user profile is a copy of the local profile that is copied to, and stored on, a server share. This profile is downloaded to any computer that a user logs onto on a network. Changes made to a roaming user profile are synchronized with the server copy of the profile when the user logs off. The advantage of roaming user profiles is that users do not need to create a profile on each computer they use on a network.
• Mandatory User Profiles. A mandatory user profile is a type of profile that administrators can use to specify settings for users. Only system administrators can make changes to mandatory user profiles. Changes made by users to desktop settings are lost when the user logs off.
• Temporary User Profiles. A temporary profile is issued each time that an error condition prevents the user’s profile from loading. Temporary profiles are deleted at the end of each session, and changes made by the user to desktop settings and files are lost when the user logs off. Temporary profiles are only available on computers running WindowsВ 2000 and later.

A user profile consists of the following elements:

• A registry hive. The registry hive is the file NTuser.dat. The hive is loaded by the system at user logon, and it is mapped to the HKEY_CURRENT_USER registry key. The user’s registry hive maintains the user’s registry-based preferences and configuration.
• A set of profile folders stored in the file system. User-profile files are stored in the Profiles directory, on a folder per-user basis. The user-profile folder is a container for applications and other system components to populate with sub-folders, and per-user data such as documents and configuration files. Windows Explorer uses the user-profile folders extensively for such items as the user’s Desktop, Start menu and Documents folder.

User profiles provide the following advantages:

• When the user logs on to a computer, the system uses the same settings that were in use when the user last logged off.
• When sharing a computer with other users, each user receives their customized desktop after logging on.
• Settings in the user profile are unique to each user. The settings cannot be accessed by other users. Changes made to one user’s profile do not affect other users or other users’ profiles.

User Profile Tiles in Windows 7 and Later

In WindowsВ 7 or later, each user profile has an associated image presented as a user tile. These tiles appear to users on the User Accounts Control Panel item and its Manage Accounts subpage.. The image files for the default Guest and default User accounts also appear here if you have Administrator access rights.

NoteВ В The Manage Accounts subpage is accessed through the Manage another account link in the User Accounts Control Panel item.

• %ProgramData%\Microsoft\User Account Pictures\Guest.bmp
• %ProgramData%\Microsoft\User Account Pictures\User.bmp

The user’s tile image is stored in the %SystemDrive%\Users\ \AppData\Local\Temp folder as .bmp. Any slash characters (\) are converted to plus sign characters (+). For example, DOMAIN\user is converted to DOMAIN+user.

The image file appears in the user’s Temp folder:

• After the user completes the initial system setup (OOBE).
• When the user first launches the User Accounts Control Panel item.
• When the user goes to the Manage Accounts subpage of the User Accounts Control Panel item. In addition, tiles for all other users on the computer are shown.

Those instances are the only times that the images are created or updated. Therefore, there are several caveats to keep in mind when using the Temp folder location programmatically:

The user’s tile is not guaranteed to be present. If the user deletes the .bmp file, for instance manually or through a utility that deletes temporary files, that user tile is not automatically recreated until the user launches the User Accounts Control Panel item or Manage Accounts subpage.

User tiles for other users on the computer might not be present in the currently logged-on user’s Temp folder. For example, if User A creates User B through the User Accounts Control Panel item, User B’s tile is created in User A’s Temp folder when Windows sends User A to the Manage Accounts subpage. Because the directory structure is not created for User B until he or she logs on, User A’s Temp folder is the only location that User B’s tile is stored. When User B logs on, the only image stored in User B’s Temp folder is his or her own.

1. To get all user tiles for users on a system, applications might need to search in each user’s Temp directory.
2. Because the access control list (ACL) of these Temp directories allows access to SYSTEM, Administrator, and the current user, applications need to elevate to access for other users.

Other users’ tiles are not guaranteed to be up-to-date in their Temp folders. If User B updates his or her user tile, User A will not see the change until User A accesses the Manage Accounts subpage. Therefore, if applications use User A’s Temp folder to obtain User B’s tile, those applications can get an out-of-date image file.

How to rename User Folder in Windows 10?

I recently upgrade from windows 8.1 single language to windows 10 home single language on my computer. But the user folder has a wrong user name. Is there a way to change it? I have gone through settings and the control panel (user accounts) and see nothing there. I have read that you can delete the account and set up a new one, but do not want to do that.

I use a Microsoft account user.

what is the most easy and safe way?

Replies (19) 

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As has been said officially you cannot rename the user folder once it has been created, there are guides to do so but this is unsupported and could potentially cause problems.

The safest option is to create a new user using a Local Account with the name of the account being what you want the folder to be because that is what is used. Make it an Administrator account.

Then switch the current Main account to a Local Account, this releases the Microsoft Account credentials.

Then switch the new account to being a Microsoft Account where it will ask what credentials are to be used. It will however leave the folder name as it was originally set up. You can copy files and folders from one user profile to the other.

There is a way to copy the entire profile from the old account to the new but it cannot be done whilst either account is active. In that case you would need to have a 3rd temporary account to log on with (also Admin) to do the copy then delete it afterwards.

I only found this out because my user profile folder was «Hairy», not good! In fact with this system I set up Windows 10 using a Local Account in the 1st place then changed it to an MA after the profile had been created.

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I’m in the midst of setting things up after a clean install of 10 Pro, and it’s named my user folder to g_ala, the first part of my e-mail address used to login to my Microsoft account.

It also slapped something random on for the computer name, instead of how Windows 7 and earlier did, use your first name with -PC or something added. So I had to fix that. Next will be getting this changed from an MS account to a local one, then changing the @#%%@^ user folder name.

Why does Microsoft have to break things that were working perfectly fine?

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Just bear in mind that actually changing the active folder can cause problems.

If you use an unsupported solution you end up giving a getout for MS if ANYTHING does not work properly. As said I now set up my computer with a local account in the 1st instance to set the User folder how I want it then convert that to a MS account after the profile is created.

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I’ve renamed user folders on previous versions of Windows. Never had any problems. I did them by searching the Registry for all instances of the old path and changing them to the new path.

With 10, after changing my account from the Administrator account, I also had to look up how to get to the full featured Users control panel in order to change the login name. The «modern» version is pretty, and not too useful with its «feature reduction».

Finally got all the drivers installed, got the little hack written into the Registry to force Device Manager to give me the Policies tab on drive controllers so I can make it NOT show the drives connected to the Marvell SATA controller as removable. There’s *another* iron ball MS has dropped on their foot. Haven’t seen *that bug* since Windows XP after SATA first was introduced.

The worst problem by far with 10 was the non-functioning networking, wired and/or wireless, many people had. They didn’t get that resolved for nearly a year, with the July 12, 2016 Servicing Stack Update. It was so bad they had to release the fix for both RTM and 1511 because people on RTM needed functioning Internet in order to get the 1511 update. Then after the 1607 Anniversary Update, there was a hotfix released that for some broke networking again.

How many years has Microsoft been doing TCP-IP networking? How could they drop that ball, several times?