
Remember, regardless of this button's visibility, you can always launch Disk Cleanup using the cleanmgr command. Once you enable the "Custom size:" option and click the "Apply" button, the missing Disk Cleanup button will reappear as if by magic: This is how things look when it is set to the option that says "Don't move files to the Recycle Bin. In its Properties, you need to enable the option called "Custom size:". To make the Disk Cleanup button visible again in the Drive Properties dialog in Windows 10, right click the Recycle Bin icon on your Desktop. Which developer at Microsoft implemented this weird behavior and why remains a mystery to me. This does not make any sense, because the Disk Cleanup utility includes plenty of other options to clean up the drive besides Recycle Bin files. You might be surprised to know that the visibility of the "Disk Cleanup" button depends on the settings of the Recycle Bin! If you disable the Recycle Bin, that is, if you configure Windows such that deleted files bypass the Recycle Bin and directly get deleted, then the "Disk Cleanup" button will disappear from Drive Properties. In this article, I will explain why it disappears and how to restore it back to where it was originally. If you open the Disk Properties dialog in Windows 10, you might find that the "Disk Cleanup" button is missing on the General tab. To the right of each item is the disk drive space each of the items are taking up on the hard drive.RECOMMENDED: Click here to fix Windows issues and optimize system performance In the next window that opens, check each of the boxes you want to clean up. Select the appropriate drive and click OK. Once Disk Cleanup opens, the initial window asks you which drive you want to clean up. In System Tools, click the Disk Cleanup utility.Click Programs > Accessories > System Tools.In the Run text field, type cleanmgr and press Enter.In the menu, tap or click the Run option.


Running Disk Cleanup at least once a month is an excellent maintenance task and frequency.Īs the image shows, Disk Cleanup can delete temporary Internet files (associated with Internet Explorer), downloaded program files, and offline webpages. Removing unnecessary files, including temporary files, helps speed up and improve the performance of the hard drive and computer. It allows users to remove files that are no longer needed or that can be safely deleted. Disk Cleanup is a Microsoft software utility first introduced with Windows 98 and included in all subsequent releases of Windows.
