How to Show Hidden Files in Windows 7 [Shortcut Tips]

To prevent users from editing or deleting their files and possibly harming their computers, Windows 7 hides crucial folders and files. Hidden files are not automatically displayed in Windows 7. If an application consumes excessive amounts of memory, Windows utilizes a certain system file to release additional RAM.

However, you can manually show hidden files Windows 7 to view the files and folders you want. Users of Windows 7 could run into a situation where certain files are either hidden or not visible. There are a number of causes for this.

• 📇By default, Windows hides many files and directories, protecting users from deleting or changing anything they shouldn't.
• 🛡️Windows Defender is restricting access to some directories.
• ✍️Users may inadvertently tamper with some files or even delete them.
• 🗂️In Windows File Explorer, some files could have enabled the "hidden" property.

A user can also make a file hidden by turning on the hidden attribute in the attributes of a specific file or folder. Because of this, having access to any hidden files that could be present on your computer can occasionally be useful. This guide covers how to view hidden files in Windows 7.

🔖View Missing Files in Windows 7 via EaseUS Software

But in most instances, you may have lost the files and folders before due to accidental deletion, system crash, virus attack, and misoperation. Thus, you should get the vanished files via professional third-party software - EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard.

This software will assist you in finding files that have been deleted or concealed by a virus like a shortcut infection. In addition to recovering deleted files from your computer hard drive or external storage devices, it also assists with hidden files.

Download this data recovery tool and show hidden files with it.

Note: To guarantee a high data recovery chance, install EaseUS data recovery software on another disk instead of the original disk where you lost files. 

Step 1. Launch EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard on your Windows 11, Windows 10, Windows 8, or Windows 7 computer. Select the disk partition or storage location where you lost data and click "Scan".

Step 2. This recovery software will start scanning the disk to find all lost and deleted files. When the scan process completes, click "Filter" > "Type" to specify lost file types.

Step 3. Preview and restore lost Windows files. You can double-click to preview the scanned files. Then, select the target data and click the "Recover" button to save them to another safe spot in the PC or an external storage device.

If you find it helpful to show hidden files on Windows 7. Don't forget to mark this passage by sharing it on Facebook, Twitter, or SNS.

🔖Show Hidden Files in Windows 7 on Control Panel

Before you are going to show hidden files in Windows 7, watch this video first. It provides you with more details on the operation of dealing with the protected files.

• 00:15 - Introduction
• 00:31 - Open Control Panel
• 01:24 - Hide Folders Again
• 01:39 - Outroduction

Please follow these instructions to allow the viewing of hidden and protected system files in Windows 7 with the control panel:

Step 1. Close all the opening applications before starting the procedure.

Step 2. Click the "Start" icon at the bottom left corner of the desktop. The Start menu will open.

Step 3. Select the "Control Panel" menu item by clicking.

Step 4. Go to the link for Appearance and Personalization.

Step 5. Select the Show hidden files and Folders option.

Step 6. Select the radio button for "Show hidden files, folders, and drives" under the "Hidden files and folders" area.

Step 7. The "Hide extensions for known file types" checkbox should be unchecked.

Step 8. The "Hide protected operating system files (Recommended)" checkbox should be cleared.

Step 9. When you're finished, your Folder Options screen should resemble the one below.

Step 10. Press the "Apply" and "OK" buttons consecutively.

At this point, Windows 7 will be set to display all hidden files on your desktop.

🔖Unhidden Files in Windows 7 with Command Prompt

It's really simple to show hidden files when using the Command Prompt: just use the dir /a command to display them. You can use the /a argument to display all hidden files or the /a:h or /a:s arguments to display only hidden or protected operating system files, respectively.

In contrast to the output of the command without it above, you can see in this example that when the extra argument is supplied, the desktop.ini file unexpectedly appears in the list of files.

In a more recent version of Windows, such as Windows 11, File Explorer can be used to view the hidden file settings quickly. View > Show > Hidden objects has the toggle.

Final Words

Although you can conceal private documents so that nobody can access them, this is not a suitable way to guarantee security or privacy. In order to get the desired level of security, you should employ "permissions" for a file.

You can try the aforementioned options whenever you want Windows 7 to display hidden files. The first approach is the most useful because it enables easy clicking to reveal hidden files. Run EaseUS data recovery software to scan and recover lost data if you have lost files or files that are missing in Windows 7.

Show Hidden Files in Windows 7 FAQs

Here are 4 additional questions about showing hidden files in Windows 7. Check here for the answers.

1. How to show hidden files in Windows 7 using CMD?

• Open the Administrator command-line interface.
• Go to the drive where the files that you wish to retrieve are hidden.
• Then press Enter after typing attrib -s -h -r /s /d *. *.
• So that's it. All of the hidden files and folders are now available to you as regular files, and you can use them.

2. How do I show hidden files in files in Windows 10?

• From the taskbar, launch File Explorer.
• Choose View > Options > Modify the search and folder options.
• Choose Show hidden files, folders, and drives under Advanced Options on the View tab, then click OK.

3. How do I turn off hidden files in Windows 7?

• Pick the View tab in the Folder Options box.
• Find the window's Advanced options area.
• Choose Don't reveal hidden files, folders, or drives under Hidden files and folders.
• Afterward, click OK.

4. Why are some files hidden in Windows 7?

Important system files are concealed by Windows 7 so that you won't typically see them while browsing your PC. These files are hidden because they could be accidentally modified or even deleted by users, which would cause Windows 7 activities to stall.