This HIDDEN Windows Folder is STEALING Your Storage Space, by Britec09 on YouTube. 8 min 59 s.
- Video length
- 8 min 59 s
- Time to do it
- 20 minutes
- Difficulty
- Medium
- Steps
- 10
What you need
Steps
Open File Explorer, click This PC and note the free space on your C: drive so you have a number to compare against later.
In File Explorer, click View, then Show, then tick Hidden items. Now open C:\Windows\Installer to see the folder.
Do not delete files in this folder by hand. The cached.msi and.msp files are needed to repair, update and uninstall your programs.
Create a restore point first. Press Start, type Create a restore point, open System Protection and click Create.
Back up any important documents to another drive or to cloud storage before you run any cleanup tool.
Download Installer Clean from the no-faff/InstallerClean GitHub page and save the file to your Downloads folder.
Right-click the tool and choose Run as administrator, then let it scan your system for orphaned installer files.
Review the list it finds, remove the orphaned entries, and leave anything it flags as still linked to an installed program.
Go back to This PC and check the free space on C: to see how much you reclaimed.
Restart your PC, open a few programs and try a repair install on one of them to confirm nothing broke.
Tips and common mistakes
Never empty the Installer folder manually, or Windows may refuse to uninstall or update those programs later.
Run the cleanup tool as administrator, otherwise it cannot read or remove files in the Windows folder.
Keep the restore point until you have opened your main programs and confirmed they still work.
If you only need a few gigabytes, try Storage Sense and Disk Cleanup before touching the Installer folder.
Questions
Is it safe to delete the Windows Installer folder?
No, not the whole folder. Only orphaned files that no longer belong to an installed program can go, which is what the cleanup tool looks for.
Why is the Installer folder so large?
Windows keeps a cached copy of every setup file used to install or update a program, and old leftovers stay behind after programs are removed or upgraded.
How much space will I get back?
It depends on how many programs you have installed and removed over the years. Some PCs free a few hundred megabytes, others several gigabytes.
This guide was drafted from the video's details and general task knowledge. It has not been checked against the full video. Check the video and relevant product instructions before following a procedure. Report a correction.
