Clear Clipboard History in Windows 10

Here's how to clear Clipboard History in Windows 10.

Windows 10 comes with a new Clipboard History feature. It implements a cloud-powered clipboard, which allows syncing your clipboard contents and its history across devices you use with your Microsoft Account. It is possible to clear your Clipboard History in Windows 10 without using third-party tools.

The Cloud Clipboard feature is officially named Clipboard History. It uses Microsoft's cloud infrastructure and utilizes the same technologies that made it possible to have your preferences synchronized across your devices, and your files made available everywhere with OneDrive. The company describes it as follows.

Copy paste – it’s something we all do, probably multiple times a day. But what do you do if you need to copy the same few things again and again? How do you copy content across your devices? Today we’re addressing that and taking the clipboard to the next level – simply press WIN+V and you’ll be presented with our brand-new clipboard experience!

Not only can you can paste from the clipboard history, but you can also pin the items you find yourself using all the time. This history is roamed using the same technology which powers Timeline and Sets, which means you can access your clipboard across any PC with this build of Windows or higher.

Here is how the clipboard history looks in Windows 10.

Currently, the clipboard data sync feature only works for clipboard content less than 100kb. The clipboard history supports plain text, HTML and images less than 4MB. Microsoft has change the image size limit up to 4MB in order to handle full-size screenshots taken on modern HiDPI screens.

This post will show you how to clear the Clipboard History in Windows 10. To clear your clipboard history, you should use the Settings app. Here is how it can be done.

To clear your clipboard history in Windows 10

1. Open the Settings app.
2. Navigate to System > Clipboard.
3. On the right, go to the section Clipboard history.
4. Turn off the toggle option below the Save multiple items text.

This will clear your clipboard history completely, including pinned items. But don't forget to turn on the Clipboard history option in order to continue using this feature and sync its data between your PCs.

However, it is possible to clear your clipboard history without removing the pinned items. It is also very easy.

Clear Clipboard History without removing Pinned Items

1. Open the Settings app.
2. Navigate to System > Clipboard.
3. On the right, go to the section Clear clipboard data.
4. Finally, click on the Clear button.

That's it!

Additionally, you can remove individual items from the clipboard history.

Delete Individual Items from the Clipboard History

1. Press the Win + V keys to open the clipboard history.
2. Click on the See more menu button with three dots.
3. Select Delete to remove the current item.
4. Alternatively, you can select the desired clipboard item using Up and Down arrows. Pressing the Delete key will remove it.

You are done.

Also from the same flyout, you can remove all clipboard history entries excluding the pinned items. Here's how you can do that.

Remove Clipboard History excluding Pinned Items from Win+V Flyout

1. Open the clipboard history flyout with the Win + V keys.
2. Click on the Clear all button to the right of the Clipboard label.
3. This will remove all items besides the pinned entries.

Finally, you can clear the local clipboard data without making changes to the Clipboard History feature. This can be done in any version of Windows 10, and also works in Windows 8.1 and Windows 7. For this, you can use the built-in clip command.

Clear Local Clipboard Data from Command Prompt

1. Open a new command prompt.
2. Type or copy-paste the following command: echo off|clip.
3. This will clear what is currently in the Windows clipboard to paste.
4. You can now close the command prompt.

You are done.

Also, you can create a shortcut for this command, and even assign a hotkey to it to quickly remove the clipboard contents on demand, as described in the following post.

Clear clipboard data in Windows 10 with a shortcut or a hotkey

That's it.

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