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  1. C:
  2. Users
  3. <utilisateur>
FolderRisk: Caution

<utilisateur> C:\Users\<utilisateur>

C:\Users\<utilisateur>: an account's profile (%USERPROFILE%) with Desktop, Documents, Downloads, the NTUSER.DAT hive and the AppData folder.

Updated on By AltF4 Formation

What it’s for

Windows creates a profile folder for every account that signs in to the machine. Its path is %USERPROFILE%, that is %SystemDrive%\Users\%USERNAME%, and Microsoft calls it FOLDERID_Profile. The parent folder of profiles is normally C:\Users (the ProfilesDirectory setting). For a Microsoft account, the folder name uses the first five characters of the email address, not the display name. In this page, <utilisateur> stands for the account name.

What it contains

  • The personal folders: Desktop, Documents, Downloads, Pictures, Music, Videos.
  • AppData (hidden) with Local, LocalLow and Roaming, where applications keep their data.
  • NTUSER.DAT, the user’s Registry hive (HKEY_CURRENT_USER).
  • Depending on the version, compatibility junctions (Application Data, Local Settings…).

Risks and best practices

  • Renaming the folder breaks the profile, because the path stored in the Registry does not follow. To change a name, create a new profile and migrate the data.
  • To delete a profile, use Advanced System Settings > User Profiles, or Win32_UserProfile. Deleted from File Explorer, it leaves its Registry key and SID behind.
  • Back up or redirect Documents and Desktop (OneDrive, folder redirection) before any cleanup.
  • On a shared machine or an RDS server, watch profile sizes: profiles are what fills the disk.

Useful commands

Fenêtre de terminal
# Profiles registered on the machine, oldest first
Get-CimInstance Win32_UserProfile | Where-Object { -not $_.Special } |
  Sort-Object LastUseTime | Select-Object LocalPath, LastUseTime, SID


# Size of a profile (may take a long time)
Get-ChildItem $env:USERPROFILE -Recurse -Force -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue | Measure-Object -Property Length -Sum


# Cleanly remove an unused profile (simulation; replace the path)
Get-CimInstance Win32_UserProfile | Where-Object LocalPath -eq 'C:\Users\olduser' | Remove-CimInstance -WhatIf

Folder contents

Folders 4

Files 1

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