How to disable thumbnail previews for folders only in File Explorer

Many users want to disable thumbnails for folders only in File Explorer, but keep previews for files. That's because those small overlays over the folder icon rarely become informative, and can't give you an idea what is in the folder. So it is better to keep them off, making File Explorer show only a big folder icon tile. But for files, thumbnail previews are pretty useful.

File Explorer can display thumbnail previews of files in many versions of Windows. This has started in XP, and now it is the default feature of the app.

To manage preview thumbnails, you can use a special option in app's settings. The Folder Options dialog includes a checkbox called Always show icons, never thumbnails.

A similar option exists in the System Performance options called Show thumbnails instead of icons.

But the problem is that both options disable thumbnails for both folders and files. There is no separate setting to disable previews, say, only for files or only for folders. So by changing any of the mentioned options you make File Explorer show icons only for everything.

The workaround for this issue is to override the default thumbnail image for all folders in the Registry, and clean up the thumbnail cache for File Explorer for the changes to take effect.

Disable Thumbnails Preview for Folders Only

To turn off thumbnail previews for folders in File Explorer but keep them for files, do the following.

1. Launch Registry Editor by pressing Win + R and typing regedit in the Run dialog.
2. Navigate to the following key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Classes\Local Settings\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\Bags\AllFolders\Shell.
3. Right-click the Shell key in the left tree and select New > String value.
4. Name the new value Logo.
5. Double-click the newly created Logo value and set its value to a jpeg file that doesn't exist on your computer. Like c:\notexists.jpg.
6. Close the Registry editor and press the Win + R key sequence one more time.
7. Type cleanmgr in the Run box and hit Enter.
8. In the Disk Cleanup tool, select the C: system drive.
9. Check the Thumbnails option, and click OK.

You are done! If you now open File Explorer, you will notice that directories no longer show thumbnails with their contents over the folder icon.

But for files like images and videos this option remains available.

Save your time by using a REG file

To save your clicks and key taps, I have created two REG files. Download them from here in a ZIP archive, and extract them to any folder location of your choice. Here's how to use them.

Double-click the Disable Thumbnails for Folders Only.reg file to apply the modification reviewed above. You will be prompted by the User Account Control to confirm the intention, so click Yes here.

Next, the Registry Editor app will ask you to add the changes to the Registry (merge them). Here, you should also click the Yes button.

Now the only thing you need to do is to launch cleanmgr,  select disk C:, and clean the Thumbnails entry with the Disk Cleanup app.

Finally, there is the second file, Enable Folder Thumbnails.reg. It is the undo tweak, as you could already guess.

An alternative to the Registry editing is the option in the Winaero Tweaker app. It involves much less steps and is specially great if you are a regular app user.

Turn off thumbnails for folders but keep for files with Winaero Tweaker

1. Download Winaero Tweaker app from here.
2. Run the installer and follow its easy and intuitive steps.
3. Launch the app, and navigate to File Explorer > Disable Thumbnail Previews for Folders.
4. On the right side, place a check mark for the  eponymous option, and this is all that you have to do.

From now on you will only have thumbnails for folders only.

Disable previews for folders in File Explorer with a batch file

Finally, here's one more method to have previews only for files in File Explorer. By creating a simple batch file, you can combine both the registry modification and the thumbnail cleanup. Note that the File Explorer will be restarted automatically when running the batch file.

To disable previews for folders with keeping them for files, do the following.

1. Download this ZIP archive and extract it to any folder of your choice.
2. Double-click the file Disable_folder_thumbnails_keep_file_previews.cmd to run it.
3. The taskbar will flash for a moment when applying the change.

You are done. Here's the content of the batch file.

@echo off
taskkill /f /im explorer.exe
timeout 2
reg add "HKCU\Software\Classes\Local Settings\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\Bags\AllFolders\Shell" /v Logo /t REG_SZ /d notexist.jpg /f
del /f /s /q /a "%LocalAppData%\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer\thumbcache_*.db"
timeout 2
start explorer.exe

Finally, you will find another batch file, Restore_folder_thumbnail_previews.cmd. This is an undo file that restores the disabled previews for folders on demand. Use it if you changed your mind.

That's it!