5 ways to fix OneDrive’s worst annoyances on Windows

On Windows, OneDrive is built right into the operating system. Even if you don’t turn it on, it will pop up occasionally, asking you to “back up your files to the cloud.” What that really means, of course, is that Microsoft wants you to move your folders to OneDrive.

I’m not here to knock OneDrive. I use OneDrive — I think the 1TB of storage offered as part of Microsoft 365 subscriptions is a great deal. Even so, sometimes OneDrive still gets on my nerves. If you don’t use it, there’s a good chance you find it really annoying. (That may be why I get a lot of questions about OneDrive from readers of my Windows Intelligence newsletter.)

There’s some good news, though: Microsoft has improved some of OneDrive’s worst pain points. In recent updates, some long-standing annoyances — like glitchy remnants of OneDrive sticking around in File Explorer after you uninstall it — have been addressed. But the service can still be exasperating in a variety of ways.

Here’s how to take control of OneDrive, whether you want to make it less of a pest or remove it entirely from your Windows 10 or Windows 11 PC.

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OneDrive Windows fix #1: Enable local file storage

By default, OneDrive likes to download files “on demand.” That can be convenient — after all, you might have up to 1TB of files in your OneDrive account if you’re taking advantage of that Microsoft 365 storage. All of that data wouldn’t even fit on many laptops.

But perhaps you want to ensure all your files are on your PC, so you can quickly access them without waiting for OneDrive to download them every single time. Or maybe you just want to ensure they’re downloaded before you remove OneDrive.

Whatever the case, to make all your OneDrive files always available offline, open File Explorer, right-click the OneDrive folder in the left sidebar, and select “Always keep on this device.” OneDrive will download everything and ensure that future files stay downloaded. This might use a lot of disk space, of course, depending on how many files you have stored in OneDrive — but it can certainly be done.

You’ll find the “Always keep on this device” in File Explorer’s context menu on both Windows 10 and Windows 11.Chris Hoffman, IDG

You can monitor the progress of any downloads from the OneDrive system tray icon. Just click it, and you’ll see what OneDrive is doing.

If you have a lot of files in OneDrive and you don’t want them all to sync to your PC, you can first select “Account” in the left sidebar of that area, click “Choose folders,” and then choose exactly which folders you do want to sync. Any folders you uncheck will be ignored by OneDrive — stored in the cloud, but not on your PC.

OneDrive Windows fix #2: Turn off folder backup

Windows offers to “back up” your important folders to OneDrive, and it can get pretty pushy about this. In fact, Windows might sometimes simply decide to use OneDrive folders for everything when you set up a new PC, without even asking.

When you enable “folder backup,” that actually means “moving your folders to OneDrive.” In other words, when you enable folder backup for your Documents folder, Windows moves it from C:UsersNameDocuments to C:UsersNameOneDriveDocuments. When you disable folder backup, Windows should move the Documents folder back to its original location.

You can turn off backups for each individual folder, too. If you do, OneDrive won’t automatically sync any other folders. It will only sync files you put directly in the OneDrive folder, giving you more control. This will also use less OneDrive storage space, as you won’t have to sync every random file that ends up in your Documents folder — that might be a big help if you’re on the free tier of OneDrive and only have 5GB of storage.

This is also a critical step to take before uninstalling OneDrive if you plan to remove it from Windows (more on that in a moment). It ensures your user data folders — such as Downloads, Documents, and Pictures — are all in their original locations.

To turn off folder backup, open OneDrive settings from the system tray icon: Look for the cloud-shaped OneDrive icon, right-click it, and select “Settings.” Under Sync and backup, click the “Manage backup” button. You can turn off folder backup for a folder by flipping the switch to the right of the folder. If you don’t want to use folder backup at all, disable it for each folder, one by one, and then click “Save changes.”

OneDrive may bug you to enable folder backup, but you can turn it off.Chris Hoffman, IDG

Disabling folder backup should move your Documents, Pictures, Desktop, Music, and Videos folders back to their original locations outside of the OneDrive folder. But you might want to double-check to ensure this worked properly and all your files are where you expect them to be before you continue.

OneDrive Windows fix #3: Stop automatic image syncing

By default, OneDrive also automatically pulls in photos and screenshots — even if you have folder backup turned off for your Pictures folder.

If you’d like to stop this, ensure the “Save photos and videos from devices” and “Save screenshots I capture to OneDrive” options are turned off under Sync and backup.

There’s a good chance you already store photos in Google Photos or Apple iCloud — which means you may not want them in OneDrive, too.Chris Hoffman, IDG

OneDrive Windows fix #4: Disable Office defaults

Office apps such as Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint default to saving files to OneDrive. It’s convenient if you want access to your documents across your devices, but it’s obnoxious if you’d rather store them on your own PC — or perhaps with another cloud storage service.

To force Office apps to stop saving documents to OneDrive by default, open an Office app (like Word), click “File” on the ribbon, and click “Options.” Select “Save” in the sidebar, check “Save to Computer by default,” and choose the preferred folder where you want to save files.

There’s no need to click away from OneDrive each time you save a file — just change this setting.Chris Hoffman, IDG

One important note: The Office “AutoSave” feature only works when saving files to OneDrive or SharePoint. If you start defaulting to local storage, you won’t have AutoSave anymore; instead, you’ll have to click the “Save” button yourself, as in older versions of Office.

That said, Office’s AutoRecover feature can still help. It’ll automatically save backup copies of your documents so you can recover them if anything crashes. To ensure it’s activated, click File > Options > Save. Ensure the “Save AutoRecover information” option is checked and choose a frequency — like five or 10 minutes.

You can also quickly save a document to your computer’s local storage, even if you have OneDrive as the default save location. Just press the F12 key in Word, Excel, or PowerPoint to quickly open a traditional “Save As” dialog.

OneDrive Windows fix #5: Eliminate OneDrive entirely

You can just uninstall OneDrive if you don’t use it on either Windows 10 and Windows 11. This wasn’t always possible: In the early days of Windows 10, you ended up with a broken “OneDrive” entry in File Explorer’s sidebar if you uninstalled it normally and then had to edit the registry to fix it. That’s fixed; Microsoft has made the uninstaller work properly.

Before you do this, be sure you’ve disabled folder backup with the instructions above. That way, your folders will be stored on your PC instead of in OneDrive. If you uninstall OneDrive without turning off folder backup, they’ll remain in your OneDrive folder, and things can get messy.

With that step out of the way, you can uninstall OneDrive as you would any other application. Just open the Settings app and find the list of installed apps or launch the Control Panel and choose “Uninstall a Program.” (If you ever change your mind, you can reinstall OneDrive by downloading the installer from Microsoft’s website.)

Look for “Microsoft OneDrive” in the list and uninstall it. That’s it. OneDrive will vanish from File Explorer and your system tray. It won’t be running in the background, starting at boot, or syncing files at all anymore.

You can uninstall OneDrive in just a few quick clicks.Chris Hoffman, IDG

Also worth noting: When you uninstall OneDrive, you won’t actually lose any files. Any files you have in OneDrive will remain accessible at onedrive.com and in OneDrive apps on your other devices.

And any files you’ve locally downloaded — that should be all of them, if you followed the steps above — will still be stored on your PC. This process just “unlinks” OneDrive and your computer. 

Your OneDrive folder itself will remain on your PC, too, with any offline copies of your files, but it won’t sync again unless you reinstall OneDrive.

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