If you are using OneDrive in your Windows 11/10, you may run into thumbnails not showing in OneDrive folder. How to fix this annoying issue? Take it easy and multiple solutions will be introduced in this post by MiniTool. Let’s go to see what you should do.
OneDrive Folder Not Showing Thumbnails
When it comes to cloud storage, OneDrive may be one of the preferred choices. Developed by Microsoft, it is reliable and secure to transfer files to the cloud.
On your computer, you can add OneDrive and sync all the files to the cloud via the OneDrive folder. This folder is very useful, however, a common issue could come up if you sync pictures to the cloud – thumbnails not showing in OneDrive folder.
To be specific, there is no problem when you upload pictures to OneDrive initially and you can see the previews. But after some time, you can only see the default image icons instead of previews. Besides, the images are not named particularly, thus, it is hard to identify and find the pictures you need.
Why are OneDrive thumbnails not showing in File Explorer on Windows 11/10? OneDrive settings, corrupted thumbnail cache, incorrect File Explorer configuration, etc. could trigger the OneDrive folder not showing thumbnails. Fortunately, you can try multiple ways below to get rid of trouble.
In addition, you may encounter some other issues in OneDrive, and let’s see some common ones. Just see the corresponding posts to find workarounds: OneDrive sync pending, error 0x800701AA, OneDrive fails to sync files, etc.
How to Fix OneDrive Folder Not Showing Thumbnail
Disable Files On-Demand
The first thing you can do is to disable the Files On-Demand feature in OneDrive settings to fix the issue of no thumbnails in OneDrive folder. See how to do this thing:
Step 1: In Windows 11/10, right-click on the icon of OneDrive in Taskbar, click on the gear icon, and tap on Settings.
Step 2: In the popup, uncheck Files On-Demand.
In the new version of OneDrive, the steps to disable this feature are different and you can find details in this forum from Microsoft - Enable or Disable OneDrive Files On-Demand in Windows 11.
After that, restart your PC to see if you can see the pictures rather than the thumbnails.
Change the Settings in File Explorer
OneDrive folder not showing thumbnails may appear due to the incorrect settings in File Explorer, for example, you don’t enable the thumbnails in Windows 11/10. Just go to do this thing in the steps below:
Step 1: Open File Explorer on your PC and click View > Options > Change folder and search options.
Step 2: Go to the View tab, uncheck Always show icons, never thumbnails and click Apply > OK.
Besides, do another thing:
Step 1: Press Win + R, type sysdm.cpl, and click OK to open the System Properties window.
Step 2: Under the Advanced tab, click Settings under Performance, and check the option of Show thumbnails instead of icons.
Step 3: Click OK.
Clear Cache of Thumbnails
If the thumbnails cache goes damaged, Windows won’t load thumbnails. Thus, you need to clear the cache to let OneDrive rebuild it to fix the issue of thumbnails not showing in OneDrive folder.
Step 1: Launch Windows 11/10 Settings.
Step 2: Click System > Storage > Temporary files.
Step 3: Make sure to check Thumbnails and click Remove files.
Alternatively, you can clear the cache of thumbnails via Disk Cleanup. Just open Disk Cleanup via the search box, choose Thumbnails, and click OK > Delete Files.
These are the common ways to fix OneDrive folder not showing thumbnails. In addition, you can try to reinstall OneDrive, switch to the web version to check your pictures, or restart Windows Restart. If you find some other effective workarounds to address OneDrive thumbnails not showing, you can tell us via the Comment section.
In addition to backing up files to the cloud, you can also back up crucial data to an external hard drive. To do this thing, you can try MiniTool ShadowMaker – free backup software or the built-in Windows backup software. To know details, refer to our previous post - Windows 11 Backup to External Drive – How to Do (3 Ways). To get ShadowMaker, click the following button.
About The Author
Position: Columnist
Vera is an editor of the MiniTool Team since 2016 who has more than 7 years’ writing experiences in the field of technical articles. Her articles mainly focus on disk & partition management, PC data recovery, video conversion, as well as PC backup & restore, helping users to solve some errors and issues when using their computers. In her spare times, she likes shopping, playing games and reading some articles.