- Apr 19, 2016
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If you run an SSD or want to preserve your boot drive space as much as possible, moving download and frequently used folders from C: to another drive is a useful trick. As you would expect though, while the task is simple, Microsoft have made the process quite opaque. So if you want to change the default download folder in Microsoft Edge in Windows 10, here’s how you do it.
Microsoft Edge is a pretty good browser and once complete, should be able to go toe-to-toe with the big boys. You can’t tweak much in the browser as yet, but changing the default download locations is one thing you can do. You just don’t do it in Edge itself.
Change the default download folder in Microsoft Edge
Digging around the current version of Microsoft Edge, I cannot find any option to change the default download location. That leaves changing the Windows downloads folder or using a registry tweak. Let’s start with the tweak.
1. Type or paste ‘regedit’ into the Search Windows box.
2. Navigate to ‘HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Classes\Local Settings\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\AppContainer\Storage\microsoft.microsoftedge_8wekyb3d8bbwe\MicrosoftEdge\Main’.
3. Right click in the right pane and select New, String Value and call it ‘Default Download Directory’.
4. Double click ‘Default Download Directory’ and set the location. I used ‘D:EdgeDownloads’ in the example, you can set it where you like.
5. Close regedit and restart Edge. Download something to test.
Change the default download folder for all Windows 10 apps
The above tweak changes the default download location for just Edge but you can do the same for Windows 10 apps too.
1. Type or paste ‘regedit’ into the Search Windows box.
2. Navigate to ‘HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\User Shell Folders’.
3. Find ‘%USERPROFILE%\Downloads’ in the right pane.
4. Double click the entry and modify the location.
5. Close regedit and reboot your computer for changes to take effect.
More Windows 10 optimization tutorials on Tom’s Hardware:
How to turn On/Off fast startup in Windows 10
Quick guide to optimizing Windows 10
How to perform a Windows 10/Ubuntu dual boot
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