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How to Customize Any Icon in Windows 10

Here’s how to change icons on Windows 10, including program shortcuts, folders, file types, and much more.

While the default Windows icons get the job done, they aren’t particularly exciting. If you want to put a personal spin on your computer, changing Windows 10 icons is a great way to do this.

We’ll show you how to change icons on Windows 10, including program and folder icons. With a bit of work, you’ll have an all-new interface!

Where to Find Custom Icons for Windows 10

Before you start changing Windows 10 icons, you need some new icons to replace them with. The OS has a few additional icons built-in, but they’re not that great.

Flaticon is a great resource for all your Windows icon needs. The site contains over a million high-quality icons arranged in thousands of convenient packs. You can grab everything in a pack at once, or download single icons.

The site offers downloads in several formats. We recommend downloading them in PNG for easy conversion to the ICO format. Keep all the raw downloads in a folder called PNG Icons or similar.

If you don’t find what you’re looking for here, try Findicons, IconArchive, or GraphicBurger. We’ve also looked at some great Windows icon packs in the past.

Converting PNG Images to ICO Icons

Windows uses ICO files for its icons. Thus, you’ll need to convert images from PNG (or other formats) before you use them as icons.

ConvertICO offers an easy way to do this. You can upload up to 50 PNG images at once to convert them into the ICO format. If you prefer, you can also enter the URL of an image you want to convert, cutting out the middle step of downloading the PNG.

Keep all your ICO files in their own folder. Make sure you put this somewhere permanent, as moving icon files after you have assigned them will cause problems.

How to Change Program Icons in Windows 10

Windows 10 makes it easy to change the program icon for a shortcut, but not the main executable. Thus, you should make a desktop shortcut for the app icon you want to change, if you don’t have one already.

To do this, search for an app in the Start menu, then right-click its name and choose Open file location. In the resulting folder, right-click the program name and choose Send to > Desktop (create shortcut).

Now you can modify the new shortcut on your desktop. Right-click it and choose Properties to open a new window. Here, switch to the Shortcut tab and click the Change Icon button at the bottom.

You’ll see a list of alternative icons included in the app, if there are any. To set your own icon, click Browse and navigate to the place where you saved your ICO files.

Double-click one to select it, then choose OK on both open dialog boxes. That’s all you have to do to change a program icon in Windows 10.

Pinning Custom Icons to the Taskbar

Want to customize the icons on your Taskbar too? The easiest way to do this is to follow the steps above to create custom desktop icons. After that, simply right-click a shortcut and choose Pin to Taskbar.

If you’d rather, you can customize an icon already pinned to your Taskbar. While holding Shift, right-click the app icon and choose Properties. From here, you can follow the same steps as above to set a new icon.

You may need to wait a few moments for changes you make in this way to take effect.

How to Change Individual Folder Icons in Windows 10

Changing a folder icon is similar to the above process. Right-click the folder you’d like to change and choose Properties.

On the resulting window, switch to the Customize tab. Select the Change Icon button at the bottom to select a new icon from your computer. Windows includes many default icons for this, but most of them are old-school and ugly. Hit Browse to locate your custom icons instead.

If you ever change your mind, just open this window and choose Restore Defaults to get the original icon back.

How to Change All Windows Folder Icons at Once

Want to change all the standard folder icons on your computer with one action? You’ll have to dig into the Registry to do so. Remember that it’s possible to damage your system by doing this, so take care if you choose to do so.

First, type regedit into the Start menu to open the utility. You’ll need to provide administrator permissions to continue. Navigate to the following location:

Now, right-click on the Explorer folder in the left navigation tree and select New > Key. Name the new key Shell Icons, then select it in the left panel. In the blank space on the right, right-click and choose New > Expandable String Value. Set its name as 3. Repeat this to create another string called 4.

Now, double-click the 3 string you just made. In the Value data field, enter the location of your folder icon in quotes. An easy way to do this by holding Shift while right-clicking your ICO file, then selecting the Copy as path option.

It should look something like this:

Repeat this for the 4 string, then click OK and exit the Registry Editor.

If you don’t see the change take effect upon opening a new File Explorer window, you’ll need to restart File Explorer for your changes to take effect. To do this, press Ctrl + Shift + Esc to open the Task Manager. Click More details to expand it if needed. On the Processes tab, find Windows Explorer. Right-click this and choose Restart.

This should apply your new icon to all folders. To remove this in the future, simply delete the Shell Icons Registry key you created.

We tested this method as working in Windows 10 version 20H2, but other users have reported that it has no effect. Your mileage may thus vary depending on your version of Windows 10.

How to Change File Icons by Type

Normally, for each file type, Windows shows an icon of the default program. If you’d like to change this, you can use a free utility called FileTypesMan to change the icon for any file type.

After downloading and running it, press Ctrl + F to locate the file type you want to change. Double-click it in the list to open a new window with many more options. Next to the Default Icon field, you’ll see a . button.

Click this and you’ll open the familiar Windows dialog box that lets you change the icon.

Using this, you can set up separate icons to distinguish file types, even if they open in the same program. You might want to make it easier to pick out JPG and HTML files at a glance, or spot old DOC Word files not using the newer DOCX format, for instance.

How to Change Drive Icons in Windows

Want to change the icons that you see in This PC for your various computer drives? A free utility called Drive Icon Changer makes this easy.

It’s similar to FileTypesMan mentioned above, but much more basic. Simply select a drive and the desired icon, and it will apply them for you after a restart. That’s all it takes.

How to Create Blank Taskbar Icons

Usually, all of your Taskbar icons appear alongside each other. If you’d like to add some space—perhaps to separate icons by type—you can achieve this with a workaround.

Creating Dummy Batch Files

To start, create a new folder somewhere you can keep it permanently. Name it Spaces or something similar. Inside this folder, right-click again and choose New > Text document. Double-click the file to open it.

Inside the text file, enter the following. This will create a batch file that’s a dummy; it immediately opens and closes a Command Prompt window if you click on it.

After this, go to File > Save As. In the saving dialog box, give the file a name ending in .BAT. If you want to create multiple spaces, you should then copy, paste, and rename the file so you have several named Space1.bat, Space2.bat, and so on.

Set Up a Blank Icon

Windows has blank icons built-in. But in our testing, these can appear as black squares on your Taskbar instead of transparent boxes, which is no good. This means you’ll need to quickly make your own «blank» icon.

Open an image editor (we used Paint.NET) and create a canvas that’s perfectly square: 256×256 will work. Press Ctrl + A to select the entire image, then press Del to erase it. This will create a transparent square when saved as a PNG.

However, if you leave it like this, you’ll run into the same black block problem. Thus, you need to take the Pencil tool, zoom in, and use it to draw a single pixel in a corner of the image. This will effectively be invisible when it sits on your Taskbar.

Save the file as a PNG, then use an online converter as mentioned above to convert this into an ICO file.

Creating and Pinning Shortcuts

Now, right-click each Space file you made and choose Create shortcut, as you’ll need a shortcut, not the main BAT file, in order to change the icon. Then right-click each shortcut file, select Properties, and use the Change Icon button to select your new blank icon.

Once this is done, you’ll need to add one more element in order to add these shortcuts to your Taskbar. In the Shortcut tab of each BAT file, enter explorer in front of everything in the Target box. Make sure there’s a space before the opening quotes.

Now you can right-click all your Space files and choose Pin to taskbar. They’ll appear as blank icons, allowing you to drag them wherever you like and group your other icons.

How to Change the Desktop Icon Size on Windows 10

Just want to adjust the size of Windows 10 icons on your desktop? That’s an easy fix. On the desktop, you can right-click any empty space and choose View to select Small icons, Medium icons, or Large icons.

If you don’t like one of those presets, hold the Ctrl key and scroll your mouse wheel. This gives you more granular control over icon size.

In a File Explorer window, you’ll find more size options under the View menu. The method of scrolling your mouse wheel while holding Ctrl works, too.

Windows 10 Desktop Icons Missing?

If you don’t see any icons on your desktop, chances are that you’ve hidden them all. Getting them back takes just a few clicks.

Right-click anywhere on your desktop, then select View > Show desktop icons if it’s not already checked. With this enabled, you should see your desktop icons with no problem.

If this didn’t fix your problem, your computer may be in tablet mode, which prevents your desktop icons from showing. To disable tablet mode, visit Settings > System > Tablet.

Finally, if you’re missing the default Windows 10 system icons, you’ll need to restore them in another menu. Go to Settings > Personalization > Themes and on the right side of the window, select Desktop icon settings.

This will launch a new window where you can toggle the icons for This PC, your user folder, Network, Control Panel, and the Recycle Bin. While here, you can also change the icons for these shortcuts.

Customize Every Icon in Windows

Now you know how to change nearly every icon on your Windows system. Whether you want to completely overhaul everything or just want to change a few shortcut icons, you have the tools to personalize your computer in a fun way.

If you love personalization, it thankfully doesn’t end here. There are many other ways to customize the look and feel of your Windows environment.

Want to know how to make Windows 10 look better? Use these simple customizations to make Windows 10 your own.

Ben is a Deputy Editor and the Onboarding Manager at MakeUseOf. He left his IT job to write full-time in 2016 and has never looked back. He’s been covering tech tutorials, video game recommendations, and more as a professional writer for over six years.

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8 Ways to Fix Windows 10 Desktop Icons Missing and Recover Data [MiniTool Tips]

By Alisa | Follow | Last Updated March 02, 2021

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Summary :

If you are experiencing the “Windows 10 desktop icons missing/disappeared” issue and don’t know what causes this, you can check the 8 ways in this post to fix Windows 10 desktop icons missing problem and recover the possible lost data and files for free.

Quick Navigation :

Some of you may encounter “Windows 10 desktop icons missing” issue like below.

• Why did my icons disappear from my desktop Windows 10?
• How do I get my desktop icons back on Windows 10?
• Why did my desktop icons disappear?
• Why are my desktop icons not showing up?

If you start your Windows 10 computer and find all desktop icons in your Windows 10 computer are disappeared, and don’t know how to fix it, check these 8 ways below to restore desktop icons Windows 10 and show desktop Windows 10 icons. An ultimate data recovery guide is also attached to help you recover possible lost files on Windows 10 PC for free.

How to Fix Windows 10 Desktop Icons Missing/Disappeared

1. Unhide All Desktop Icons Windows 10
2. Check Desktop Icon Settings
3. Turn off the Tablet Mode
4. Run SFC Scannow
5. Run CHKDSK
6. Rebuild Icon Cache
7. Reset this PC
8. Perform a System Restore

Quick Video Guide:

Way 1. Turn on Show Desktop Icons to Unhide All Desktop Icons Windows 10

Windows 10 desktop icons missing issue may be caused by accidentally hiding desktop icons. You can restore desktop icons Windows 10 by enabling Show desktop icons.

Step 1. Right-click the empty space on Windows 10 computer screen and click View option.

Step 2. After you click View tab, you can see several options for managing desktop icons. Navigate and check if the option Show desktop icons are ticked, if not, make it ticked. Then check if you get all missing desktop icons back.

If you even can’t right-click the desktop, you can continue to check other ways below.

Way 2. Fix Windows Desktop Icons Missing by Checking Desktop Icon Settings

Your Windows 10 icons may be hidden, the second step you can take is to show desktop icons in Windows 10 through Settings.

Step 1. You can right-click the computer screen and click Personalize. If you can’t right-click the desktop screen, you can click Start -> Settings -> Personalization.

Step 2. Then choose Themes, and click Desktop icon settings.

Step 3. Then you can select which kinds of desktop icons you’d like to show on Windows computer, and click Apply and OK.

Check if Windows 10 desktop icons are shown now, it not, continue to try other ways.

Way 3. Turn off the Tablet Mode to Show Desktop Icons

If you have a touch screen, the computer may have two screen modes: Desktop Mode and Tablet Mode. If your Windows 10 computer is in Tablet mode, the desktop icons may not be shown properly. You can turn off Tablet mode to see if “Windows 10 desktop icons disappeared” problem can be solved.

Step 1. You can click Start and Settings to open Windows 10 settings.

Step 2. Click System to open system settings window, and select Tablet mode in the left panel.

Step 3. Make sure the status of Table mode is Off, to turn off tablet mode.

Way 4. Run SFC Scannow to Fix Windows 10 Desktop Icons Missing Issue

SFC (System File Checker) is a Windows built-in command line tool mainly designed for helping users to scan and repair corrupted system files. If the Windows 10 icons missing issue is caused by system corruption, you can try SFC Scannow to show desktop Windows 10.

Step 1. Open Windows Command Prompt. You can press Windows logo and R keys on the keyboard at the same time. Then type cmd in the box, and hit Enter. When a window pops up asking you if you want to run it as Administrator, click Yes. You can also press Ctrl + Shift + Enter at the same time after typing cmd, to run Command Prompt as Administrator.

Step 2. Then in the Command Prompt window, you can type this command line: sfc /scannow, and hit Enter.

Wait patiently to let the SFC Scan process finish. After that, you can check if the “desktop not showing in Windows 10” issue is fixed.

How to Recover Missing Desktop Files in Windows 10

If you Windows 10 desktop icons are disappeared, some of files you stored in computer may also get lost. Don’t worry, you can easily recover lost data and files with the help of the professional best data recovery software.

MiniTool Power Data Recovery is a clean and free data recovery program, helping you to recover any deleted/lost files from computer hard drive, external hard drive, SSD, USB flash drive, SD card and more.

You can use this tool to recover lost data from almost any data loss situations, incl. system crash, virus attack, hard drive error, etc.

Free download and install MiniTool Power Data Recovery on your Windows 10 computer, and follow the 3 simple steps below to recover lost data on PC.

Step 1 – Launch the Windows 10 File Recovery Software

Open MiniTool Power Data Recovery software to enter into its main UI. And click This PC in the left column. Then you can choose a PC drive or partition, and click Scan button to start scanning the chosen partition for lost and deleted files.

Step 2 – Preview and Find Lost Files

When the scan process is finished, you can browse, preview and find the lost files and folder in the scan result window.

You can click Find to search the lost file or folder by name, or click Filter to find the files by file extension, file size range, create date, etc. You can also click Show Lost Files icon to only show lost files in the scan result, to quickly find needed files.

Step 3 – Recover Lost Files and Folders in Windows 10 PC

Check all you needed files and click Save button to choose a destination folder to store the recovered lost files. Please remember to choose a different partition to save the recovered files to prevent data overwriting.

With this free file undelete software for Windows 10, you can easily restore lost desktop files or any other lost or deleted files in your Windows 10 computer.

Way 5. Run CHKDSK to Fix Windows 10 Desktop Icons Missing

Another Windows built-in command line utility CHKDSK can also help diagnose and fix some computer issues. It can verify the file system integrity of a partition and repair hard disk logical file system errors.

Since your Windows 10 desktop icons are disappeared, you can also try CHKDSK to see if it can get back lost Windows 10 icons.

Step 1. Press Windows + R key on the keyboard, type cmd, and hit Enter to open Command Prompt.

Step 2. Then you can type this command line: chkdsk c: /f /r, and hit Enter. You can replace “c” with the drive letter of another partition or volume, to check and repair errors on other partitions or drives.

Way 6. Rebuild Icon Cache Windows 10

If nothing helps with the above methods, you can continue to try to rebuild icon cache in Windows 10 to fix Windows 10 desktop icons disappeared error. Check below for how to rebuild icon cache in Windows 10.

Step 1. Still, you should open Command Prompt window. You can press Windows and R key on the keyboard, type cmd, hit Enter and run command prompt as administrator.

Step 2. Then you can type the commands below to rebuild icon cache. Please hit Enter to execute the operation after typing each command line.

• taskkill /F /IM explorer.exe
• cd /d %userprofile%\AppData\Local
• attrib –h IconCache.db
• del IconCache.db
• start explorer.exe

Way 7. Reset this PC to Fix Windows 10 Icons Missing

You can also try to reset your Windows 10 PC to see if the Windows 10 desktop icons missing problem can be fixed.

Step 1. You can also click Start and click Settings. Then click Update & Security and choose Recovery option.

Step 2. Next you can click Get started under Reset this PC to carry out the resetting process.

Step 3. In the pop-up window, you can choose Keep my files and proceed to reinstall Windows while keeping all your personal files.

Way 8. Perform a System Restore to Show Desktop Windows 10

You can also try to conduct a System Restore to see if it can restore desktop icons in Windows 10.

Step 1. Click Start -> Settings -> Update & Security -> Recovery -> Restart now, to enter into Windows recovery environment.

Step 2. Next you can click Troubleshoot -> Advanced options -> System Restore.

Step 3. Then you can click your computer account and enter the password, and select a restore point to restore your Windows 10 computer to a previous state.

If the 8 ways introduced in this post don’t help you fix Windows 10 desktop icons missing issue, then you may try the last draw: reinstall Windows 10.

As for how to reinstall Windows 10 without losing data and without CD, you can check the details in this post: How to Reinstall Windows 10 without CD/USB Easily (3 Skills)

Icons Disappeared from Taskbar Windows 10 Solved

If icons are missing from Taskbar in Windows 10, you can try to use SFC or DISM to fix this issue.

• At first, you can press Windows + R key on the keyboard, type cmd in the Run box, open and run command prompt as administrator. Then type sfc /scannow and hit Enter to let the File System Checker scan and fix Windows 10 issues.
• If SFC doesn’t fix “Icons Disappeared from Taskbar Windows 10” issue, you can type this command: DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth, and hit Enter.

After that, you can reboot your Windows 10 PC to see if Windows 10 taskbar icons invisible problem has been fixed. (Windows 10 Taskbar Not Working? 6 Fast Fixes)

Fix “Can’t Move Desktop Icons on Windows 10”

Still, if some of you encounter this issue: can’t move desktop icons on Windows 10, you may try these methods below to fix this problem.

• Press Esc key on the keyboard three times.
• Change icons arrangement configuration. You can right-click the blank space on desktop and click View -> uncheck Auto arrange icons.
• You can also change icon size after you right-click the desktop and click View
• You can follow the guide above to turn off Tablet mode
• You can also follow the guide above to go to Troubleshoot and perform a system restore, etc.

In Conclusion

In conclusion, you can try the 8 methods in this post to fix Windows 10 desktop icons missing problem. If you also suffer some data loss because of this error or any other errors on Windows 10 computer, you can also follow the data recovery guide in this post to easily recover lost data and files in Windows 10 with MiniTool Power Data Recovery.

Still have issues about how to fix Windows 10 desktop icons missing problem or how to recover data from Windows 10? Please contact [email protected] .