A question some of you may have is – Where are the default Desktop Wallpapers and Lock Screen background images stored in Windows 11/10? This post will show you the location of the Wallpapers and Lock Screen backgrounds in Windows 11/10.
Where are Wallpapers stored in Windows 11/10
To see the location of the wallpapers and lock screen images, open File Explorer and navigate to the following location:
C:\Windows\Web
Here you will see three folders:
- Wallpaper
- 4K
- Screen
- TouchKeyboard (Windows 11 only)
In the Wallpaper folder, you will see the default wallpaper being stored.
In the 4K folder, you will see the default Windows 11/10 wallpaper in some very high-resolution.
Also read: Where are wallpapers from Windows themepack stored?
Where are Lock Screen images stored in Windows 11/10
To access the location of Lock Screen Background, open the 3rd folder viz, Screen. You will see the lock screen images.
If you want to change your wallpaper, you may be aware that it’s really easy and straightforward to change Theme, Lock Screen & Wallpaper.
The Personalization app allows you to change the background colors and accent, lock screen images, wallpaper, and themes on your PC.
You can set any of your personal pictures, an image from Windows, or a solid color as your desktop wallpaper. You can also display a slideshow of pictures as your Windows wallpaper. You can choose to Center, Fill, Fit, Stretch, Tile, Span wallpapers.
Here is a way, that will let you save Spotlight Lock Screen images.
Read next: Where does Windows 11/10 store Themes?
Thank you
Four months ago I “Browse”d for a new personal lock screen from my phone for my Win10 laptop. I’ve since deleted that pic from my phone, but I’d like to use it for something else. Can you please tell me where it’s stored on my laptop? Thanks!
I installed a lot of themes and the photos of those themes do not appear in any of the above folders listed. I want a slideshow of all the themes I installed but instead I only get a slideshow of any one theme I choose and I can’t select them all like in Windows 8.
Unfortunately, this doesn’t answer a question I’ve been trying to solve.
I had a folder full of images for wallpapers. I had pointed windows 10 to this folder and every few hours it would use a random image from this folder as the background on my screens as well as the that lock screen that slides up when you log in.
Well to my dismay my hard drive completely died (I suspect prematurely because of a bug in W10 that would have disk usage spike to 100%).
Anyways, to my surprise upon installing W10 on my new HDD and signing in with the same account, the images from the lost folder showed up, and continue to show up as my desktop background.
I assume these images were somehow uploaded to W10 servers (and possibly downloaded to my new Hdd), but I can’t find where or how to access them.
To find every Windows theme wallpapers in Windows 10 go to>>>>> C:Usersuser nameAppDataLocalMicrosoftWindowsThemes. Previously you need to make the appdata show. For this, open the command prompt and write >>>> attrib -s -h C:UsersusernameAppData Done!
great help thanks. I was searching and searching for these. Now i put all wallpapers in one folder and spanned across the 2 monitors on windows 10.
THIS SOOOOO GREAT. WAS SEARCHING THIS FOR A LONG TIME. HOPE SOMEONE FIND THIS HELPFUL TOO
C:Users{username}AppDataLocalPackagesMicrosoft.Windows.ContentDeliveryManager_cw5n1h2txyewyLocalStateAssets
copy and Rename file extensions to jpg
Thak you Fatih,that is, i was looking for!
Prior to the Windows 10 update, I used to be able to select different photos from my downloaded themes on my laptop. Now, I can only see one picture from the theme, or have it go through the entire slideshow. Is there a way I can choose which picture I’d like as the wallpaper for my desktop anymore? I am not a fan of Windows 10. It updated on its own this weekend, and I’m pretty disappointed with it so far. Thanks in advance for your help.
The end of that path for me was …LocalPathAssets
This is where I was able to find the “wakeup screen” image that I wanted to retain as my new wallpaper. Thanks!
Rather than 8 billion people having to do this why not Microsoft just publish a list of the photos and locations, I realise this would be expensive for multi-billionaire Bill Gates to does but he could set up a go fund me page. Great that so many people have wasted their time doing it themselves though, inteligent bunch, that’s why they chose Microshyte.
Instead of the C:Users shenanigans just browse the folder directly:
%appdata%..LocalMicrosoftWindowsThemes
I have Windows 10 and every day I open I my PC I am greeted by a lock screen photo and 9 times out of 10 I want to know where that place is or what its called……why isn’t there a link or at the very least the name of the place. If there is a hidden link or hidden name then that is just stupid as we can’t find it….its very frustrating, please sort this out….
For your theme pictures…
C:UsersAppDataLocalMicrosoftWindowsThemes
You’re my hero !!!! Thanks
how do you lock the desktop back ground?
See Points 4 and 5 : https://www.thewindowsclub.com/cannot-change-desktop-background-windows
Thanks, now I can enjoy the default wallpapers :D
This is the simplest explanation ever.
If your Local path doesn’t have a Themes dir, check the same path except on Roaming. That’s where I found mine.
How to I rename all of the file extensions to jpg? There are 200 files
Thank you.
Opened the files in my browser, worked.
I had followed the instructions on how to find my spotlight lockscreen pictures and added .jpg to the names – now these beautiful pictures vanished – how can I find, retrieve or restore/undelete them again?