Change the properties for a file

File properties contain details about a file, such as the author, any descriptive info or tags, or the date the file was last modified. Properties make it easier to find and organize your files. For example, you can sort all the photos in a folder by rating, or search for a document that you created on a particular date.

Here's how you can add or change details about a file by changing its properties:

Show all

To change common properties in the details pane

The details pane in File Explorer displays the most common properties for a file. For many file types, you can change the file properties from the details pane.

  1. Tap or click to open File Explorer.

  2. Tap or click the View tab, and then tap or click Details pane.

  3. Find the file whose properties you want to change, and then select it.

  4. In the details pane on the right side, tap or click next to the property that you want to change, enter a new value (or change the existing value), and then tap or click Save.

    Tags in the details paneAdding a tag in the details pane

    To add more than one value for a property, separate the values with semicolons. To rate a file by using the ratings property, choose the star that represents the rating you want to apply.

    Notes

    Notes

    • The properties you can change vary by file type. For example, you can specify the date a photo was taken and change its rating, but you can't do this for many other types of files. For some file types, such as .txt and .rtf files, you can't change any properties.

    • If file name extensions don't appear in File Explorer, tap or click the View tab and then select File name extensions to view them. You can change a file's extension by replacing the letters that come after the period in the file name. But be careful doing this—changing the file's extension doesn't actually change the file type. (For example, you can't convert a .png file to a .jpg file simply by changing its extension—you need to use an app to do this.) If you change a file's extension so that it doesn't match the file type, the file might not open.

To change properties that don't appear in the details pane

If you don't see the file property that you want to change in the details pane, you can open the Properties dialog box for a complete list of file properties.

  1. Tap or click to open File Explorer.

  2. Find the file whose properties you want to change, and then select it.

  3. On the Home tab, tap or click Properties.

  4. In the Properties dialog box, tap or click the Details tab.

  5. Under Value, tap or click next to the property that you want to change, enter a word or phrase, and then tap or click OK. (If the section under Value is blank, just tap or click in that spot to open a text box.)

    Notes

    Notes

    • Some properties can't be changed.

    • To make a file read-only (so that it can be opened, moved, or deleted but not changed), select the Read-only attribute on the General tab.

    To add more than one value for a property, separate the values with semicolons. To rate a file by using the ratings property, choose the star that represents the rating you want to apply.

To remove properties from a file

If you're planning to share a file with someone, you might want to remove some of the file's properties, especially if they contain personal information. For example, the author property might include the names of people who collaborated on a file, and some tags might contain words or phrases that you don't want other people to see.

  1. Tap or click to open File Explorer.

  2. Find the file whose properties you want to remove, and then select it.

  3. On the Home tab, tap or click the arrow under Properties, and then choose Remove properties.

  4. In the Remove Properties dialog box, do one of the following:

    • Choose Create a copy with all possible properties removed, and then tap or click OK. This keeps the original version of the file with all of its properties, and makes a copy you can share that has all of the properties removed.

    • Choose Remove the following properties from this file, select the check box for each property that you want to remove, and then tap or click OK. This permanently removes the selected properties from the file without making a copy.

Note

Note

With the Remove Properties dialog box, you can only remove properties that were added using Windows. If you added properties using a specific app, you need to remove them using that app.

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