In windows many times it happens that we want to delete a particular file and it is being locked by the system. The locked files are normal files which are currently being used by some process and hence the explorer locks these files and doesn’t allow anyone to delete or rename these files until the process is done.
Actually if we consider form the systems point of view then we may feel that its quiet fine for it to lock the files but form a user’s point of view this can be very annoying. So, today I am going to guide you on how to delete locked files in windows.
Solution-1:
The first solution I am going to give you will be using external software called Unlocker. You can use Unlocker to unlock the files which are being locked by the system.
So here is what you have to do:
- Download Unlocker software from here.
- Now after this right click the file which you want to delete.
- In the option select “Unlocker” and in the unlocker window select the delete option form the dropdown in the lower left corner.
- Then again select the file and click the unlock button. The file will get success fully deleted.
Solution-2:
- Open a command prompt by typing cmd in the run.
- Navigate to the location where the locked file is present.
- Right click on the taskbar, select the “task manager” option.
- In the task manger go to the Processes tab.
- End the explorer.exe process clicking the End Process button.
- Now go to the Applications tab and select New Task in the task manager. In the new task enter cmd and hit enter.
- In the command prompt go to the file location and delete that file by del command.
- Bring up the task manager windows again
- Select file->new task
- Type explorer.exe in the “create new task” field
- Press OK.
Solution -3:
- Reboot the system and try deleting that file in Safemode.
- But this only works in some cases.
- So, using the above methods you can delete locked files.
