As a fairly adaptable operating system, Windows has always had a dedicated way of browsing and viewing photos. In Windows 11/10 as well, Microsoft decided to amalgamate browsing, organizing, and viewing all together in one application and the end result is Photos App. While the Photos app is great the only caveat is that it by default shows files only from your Pictures folder. This means if you store files on an external drive or in the network using a shared folder, those images aren’t included by the app. But you can add/remove folder locations in Photos App. You can also include more folders in your picture collection- and it’s all within the settings.
This built-in Photos app in Windows allows the users to view images and perform basic editing of photos and videos, create albums, and even make movies. This application gathers photos from your system, phone, and other devices, and puts them in one collection place i.e. Local Pictures Folder along with the files stored in OneDrive. With the Photos app, you can easily look through the photos and find the one you are looking for in one single place.
In this tutorial will we will take you through the process of adding new or removing folder locations in the Photos App in Windows 11/10. Follow the next steps to add a new or remove folder location in the Photos App.
Add new folder location in the Photos App
To add a new folder with images as an additional source in Photos, follow these steps:
1] Open the ‘Start’ menu and type ‘Photos’
2] From the search results click on the ‘Photos’ app
3] From the top-right corner, click the main menu button i.e. three-dotted icon and select the ‘Settings’ option.
4] Now, under the ‘Sources’ section, click the ‘Add a folder’ button.
5] Select the new file location.
Please note, on selecting the ‘add a folder’ option, Windows gives you folder suggestions which you can simply select and add. Hence, if your desired folder location is already in the suggestions simply check the option and hit ‘add folders’. Or select ‘Add another folder’ option to go the folder of your choice.
6] Click the ‘Add this folder to Pictures’ button.
7] Once done, the new folder will be added to ‘Pictures’ and the Photos app will start indexing your images.
To add more locations to the Photos App, simply repeat the steps.
Read: Show or Hide OneDrive Images and Pictures from Private folder in Photos App
To view pictures from all folders stored in the cloud
When using OneDrive, the Photos app will inevitably display the images stored inside the Pictures folders. But, if you do not store images in the Picture folders, you will need to change the settings to empower Photos to scan images from all the folders stored on the cloud.
To sync pictures from all folders stored in the cloud, follow these steps:
1] Open the ‘Start’ menu and type ‘Photos’
2] From the search results click on the ‘Photos’ app
3] From the top-right corner, click the main menu button i.e. three-dotted icon and select the ‘Settings’ option.
4] Now, under the ‘Microsoft OneDrive’ section, open the drop-down menu, and hit the ‘All folders’ option.
Photos will now start displaying images from all folders stored on the cloud, i.e. OneDrive.
In case you do not prefer to see images from OneDrive, then simply turn off the ‘Show my cloud-only content from OneDrive’ toggle switch.
Remove existing folder location in Photos App
To remove an existing location with images that you do not wish to see in Photos, follow these steps:
1] Open the ‘Start’ menu and type ‘Photos’
2] From the search results click on the ‘Photos’ app
3] From the top-right corner, click the main menu button i.e. three-dotted icon and select the ‘Settings’ option.
4] Under the ‘Sources’ section, hit the delete button i.e. ‘X’ icon appearing next to the file location.
5] Now, click the ‘Remove Folder’ button.
Once these steps are completed, the Photos App will no longer index picture from the removed location.
Please note: Removing a folder location from Photos, doesn’t delete the folder or images on it.
Done!
Do let us know if it helped you in the comments section below.
