What is Windows.old folder and how to Reclaim disk space occupied by it

What is Windows.old folder?

This folder is created if you install windows 7 by performing a custom installation or upgrade your Windows 7 Operating system without formatting the partition.

Why the folder gets created?

Files that were used in the previous version of Windows are backed up here during installation.

It provide a roll back point to restore your previous OS if you don't like Windows 7. Also, you can restore data from this backup directory.

For example: If you lost your Mozilla firefox bookmarks during OS upgrade, you can restore them from Windows.old directory. Refer post - Recover Firefox Bookmarks.



Is it safe to delete that folder?

Windows.old directory does occupy good amount of hard disk space. If you find that nothing is missing after upgrade, you can delete this folder else you can keep it for a while just in case you need some file from previous Windows installation. And, remove it later once you are sure nothing is missing.

I removed mine after couple of weeks since I was running out of C: drive space.



Safely reclaim disk space?

You can use disk cleanup utility to safely remove this folder.

Right click on the C:> drive, go to Properties and click on "Disk Cleanup".

Then, click on "Clean up system files" which will calculate all system files you can clean from your system.

Now, select the "Previous Windows installation(s)" check box and click OK.

Confirm by clicking "Delete files" on next window and you are done.

Thank you. I hope its helpful.