Did you know Windows 10 solved the path problem longer than 260 characters? Read the article below

On Windows 10 Anniversary Update, Microsoft finally 'solved' the problem that developers have had a headache for a long time, which is the path length limited to 260 characters.

The path length limit is 'present' on almost all Windows versions. In case you don't know, on all released Windows versions, the maximum path length of the file is 260 characters. From Windows 10 Build 14352, part of Anniversary Update (version 1607), this limit can be ignored.

All Windows file systems have 'concepts' about files and folders to access archived data. Path is a value chain to indicate where the data is stored. However, this path is limited to Windows by 260 characters, including drive letters, colons, slashes, and a terminating null character.

In some cases users face problems such as File Explorer that do not allow access to files or folders if the path to the file or folder exceeds 260 characters.

Then users have no other solution is to use symbolic links (symbolic links) to access data or use the 3rd tool to fix errors. For example, some file management tools like Total Commander can help you access files and folders. However, Explorer Shell still has this limitation on Windows for many years.

To overcome this problem, Microsoft made the appropriate changes on Windows 10. Setting up a new Group Policy built into Windows 10 build 14352 allows the operating system to have a path longer than 260 characters.

1. Through Group Policy

1. Press the Windows + R key combination to open the Run command window. Here you enter the command gpedit.msc and press Enter to open the Group Policy Editor.

2. On the Group Policy Editor window you navigate by the path:

Local Computer Policy -> Computer Configuration -> Administrative Templates -> System -> Filesystem -> NTFS

3. Here you find and activate the Enable NTFS long paths option.

4. Finally, restart your Windows 10 computer.

2. Using the Registry

1. Open Registry Editor.

Press Win + R key combination to open the Run command window. Here you enter regedit and then press Enter to open the Registry Editor.

2. In the Registry Editor window, navigate to the key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESystemCurrentControlSetPolicies

Note:

If you can't find a key, you can create those keys.

3. Next in the right pane, create a new 32-bit DWORD value, name this value LongPathsEnabled and set the value in the Value Data frame to 1 .

4. Finally, restart your Windows 10 computer.

In addition, you can refer to the video tutorial on how to activate the path over 260 characters on Windows 10n below:

Refer to some of the following articles:

1. Steps to disable or completely remove the Onedrive application on Windows 10

1. How to combine multiple hard drives into a Volume on Windows 10

1. Your Windows 10 computer is slow to connect to the Internet, this is a fix

Good luck!