For more than two decades, Windows has had a bizarre, almost stubborn, relationship with folder views. You set things up correctly, and somewhere down the line, File Explorer decides one day that it knows better. Spoiler alert: it doesn’t, and somehow he always chooses the worst possible moment to reset everything. So suddenly you’re back to giant thumbnails, jumbled columns, and a layout that just doesn’t belong in the folder you’re looking at.
This inconsistency has been annoying for decades now and, of course, it’s also why so many people tend to switch to one of File Explorer’s many brilliant alternatives. But today, after twenty years of workarounds and collective resignation, Windows 11 finally fixes the problem.
Latest version of Windows 11 brings consistency to folder views
No more editing the registry
For a very long time, you could spend several minutes configuring a folder based on its contents. Opening this folder again will give you the same view, but things will change if you access this folder in a different way. So, using a web browser to open the said folder, your preferences would immediately change and the File Explorer browser would return to the default view. It doesn’t matter how carefully you configure things, since Windows will happily undo everything without warning. For years now, users have been annoyed by File Explorer inconsistencies, but fortunately, Microsoft versions 26100.8313 and 26200.8313 have finally fixed this problem.
This is a small solution on paper, but quite important in practice. Now, if you change the layout, sort by name, turn off the “Group by Date” feature, or play with icon sizes, the update will ensure those changes persist in the folder. More importantly, they persist consistently, regardless of how you access that folder or which app led you there in the first place. Of course, this isn’t something that should have taken this long to resolve, but luckily it’s here now. More registry edits to fix the way Windows handles display instances, my friends.
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The update also adds new features to File Explorer
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Consistency in folder views isn’t the only new File Explorer update with the new versions. The official Microsoft blog for Windows mentions that File Explorer’s launch speed and performance have been improved with the new update, something long-time users will immediately notice on slower systems and older hardware. Another minor but significant annoyance experienced by many users was a white flash when launching Explorer in dark mode. This happened if you had set File Explorer to open to “This PC” instead of the default libraries. This too is now fixed.
If you are a Windows user who regularly uses the Preview pane, a “Preview anyway” button has now been added to the pane if a display warning appears. Also new is the inclusion of four new archive formats, which can now be used in File Explorer.
These changes and updates are currently in the Release Preview channel, and classic Windows 11 PCs should start receiving them any time now, given that May has begun.
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File Explorer finally seems to understand the fundamentals
For something as integral to the Windows 11 experience as File Explorer, consistency is not a “nice to have” feature. It’s more like the baseline. The whole point of a file manager is predictability. You develop muscle memory around where things are, how they are sorted, and how they are presented. When it breaks even in the smallest way possible, it adds a tiny but jarring amount of friction to something you do dozens of times a day. This is exactly why this problem has persisted in the minds of users for years. Sure, it wasn’t the end of the world, but it was still relentlessly boring.
It may have taken twenty years, but File Explorer finally respects user intent. Windows now treats how you configure a folder as a decision rather than a suggestion. After all, it’s the fundamental little quirks that truly define the day-to-day experience of using Windows. It may not be flashy and won’t sell upgrades on its own, but millions of Windows 11 users are going to be happy with this File Explorer update that aims to silently improve everything.
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File Explorer is about to get better slowly but surely There may soon come a day when users who left for better alternatives could return.
The smallest fixes can have a transformative effect when they land in the right place, and this update is an example of that. Folder views resetting when you access them through another app wouldn’t make the list of top five Windows 11 problems, and yet now that the problem is fixed, it’s a feather in the operating system’s cap. It’s the kind of repair you don’t think about until it stops being broken.
I’d take that and a hundred other screws tightened on long-standing quirks over a Windows 12 launch any day of the week. In fact, now that File Explorer appears to have begun its evolution with more of the improvements promised by its creators, the day may soon arrive when users who left for better alternatives may return. But this future is still far away. Until then, I’ll settle for small improvements, provided they continue.