Thumbnail previews help us to identify content within image and video files. Due to several reasons, file thumbnail previews do not show in Windows 11, but they can be fixed easily. However, by default Windows 11 operating system no longer support the thumbnail previews feature for multimedia folder icons. This is one of the biggest changes from the previous operating system. So we have to open each folder to see what’s there. In this article, we will help you to bring those thumbnails back.
How to Display Folder Thumbnail Preview in Windows 11?
- Download the Windows 11 Thumbnail Generator app from Github
- Now you need to run Thumbnail Generator.exe.
- Select a director and then choose the required settings for your needs.
- Press start and wait.
- The app will automatically generate thumbnails and place them in the correct directories.
- File Explorer will be restarted if the Clear Icon Cache option is checked.
- Save your work before proceeding.
If the thumbnail cache is not properly updated then Windows 11 folder thumbnails will not be updated. In this case, you need to reset the thumbnail cache. So make sure to check the Clear Icon Cache option when running the Thumbnail Generator.
The tool requires .NET 5.0 Desktop Runtime (You can find the installer here). It uses the ImageMagick library to composite natively generated thumbnails into a single folder thumbnail, and then it sets it as the folder’s icon using desktop.ini. It should be noted the tool supports only media file formats (images and videos). Currently, vertical file thumbnails (Ex: text files) are not supported.
There are several folder thumbnail generators available on GitHub. But all generators may not suit your needs. You can try Windows Thumbnail Generator Tool (The setup process mentioned above). If Windows 11 folder thumbnails are still not showing then you can roll back to the previous OS i.e Windows 10.
