How to change a drive letter in Windows 10

Changing drive letters in Windows certainly has its benefits. You can hide a specific drive from all applications on your computer, thereby preventing these applications from writing to a specific partition or editing the drive letter after adding a new HDD or SSD.

If you are looking to change drive letters in Windows 10, you have come to the right place. In this article, we will provide you with detailed steps on how to change or remove multiple drive letters.

How to change a drive letter in Windows 10

There are a couple of different ways to change a drive letter in Windows 10. Below we’ll show you how to do it with Disk Management. This is the easiest way to apply changes to your drive letters in Windows 10.

1. Right click on the Windows Start button and choose the Disk management menu option.
2. Right click on the drive you want to change a letter for and choose Change drive letter and paths from the menu.
   
3. Click Change. Windows will now ask you to give your drive a new name. You can choose from the remaining letters AZ from the menu.
   
4. Click OK.
   
5. Windows will inform you that the applications stored in this partition may not work correctly, click Yeah.

You have now successfully changed a drive letter in Windows 10.

How to change the drive letter in Windows 10 using the command prompt

Another way to change drive letters in Windows 10 is through the command prompt. This process is relatively simple:

1. Make sure you are running your PC in Administrator mode.
2. Open the command prompt. You can do this by typing “Command Prompt” in the search box and opening the app.
   
3. Once you’re in, type “part of the disk“and hit Get into.
   
4. Guy “list volume” to get a list of all available volumes on your PC.
   
5. Look at the result ###. Check the volume number of the drive whose letter you want to change.
   
6. To select the drive, type this command: “select volume [NUMBER].” Then replace [NUMBER] with the volume number your drive is on.
   
7. To change the drive letter, run this command: “assign letter =[X].” Then replace [X] with the letter you want to assign to your drive.
   

You have now changed your drive letter in Windows 10.

How to delete a drive letter in Windows 10

If you want to delete a drive letter in Windows 10, you can do so from Desk Management. Simply follow these simple steps:

1. Right click on the Windows Start button and choose Disk management from the menu.
   
2. Right click on the drive you want to remove a letter from and choose Change drive letter and paths from the menu.
   
3. Click Eliminate in the dialog box. Windows will now warn you that folders that depend on this partition may not work correctly.
   
4. Click OK to confirm the operation.

You have now successfully deleted a drive letter in Windows 10. After deleting a drive letter, you will no longer be able to see it in your File Explorer. Additionally, to delete a letter, you must log in as an administrator.

How to change a network drive letter in Windows 10

Changing a network drive letter in Windows is a fairly simple process. Simply follow these steps and you’ll be ready to go:

1. Go to the This computer section of File Explorer.
   
2. At the top of the ribbon menu, click network drive.
   
3. A dropdown menu will appear, choose the network drive option.
   
4. A new window will open asking you to choose a drive letter for your network folder. Go ahead and choose a new letter.
   
5. Enter the full address of your network share in the box labeled File. You can also search for it.
   
6. Click Finish.
   

Additional steps if you receive an error message:

1. Go to Control Panel.
   
2. Then select Network and Internet.
3. Click on Networks and shared resources.
   
4. Now, choose the Change advanced sharing settings option on the right side.
   
5. Click on Turn on network discovery.
   
6. Save your changes.
   

You will now see your network share on the This computer screen.

How to change the letter of a USB drive in Windows 10

You may want to change the letter of a USB drive in Windows 10 if Windows Explorer does not recognize the external hard drive. For this or any other reason, simply follow the simple steps shown above for an HDD/SSD to change the letter of your USB drive.

How to Change DVD Drive Letter in Windows 10

Changing the letter of a DVD drive in Windows 10 can be done easily through Disk Management. Fair follow the steps shown above to also change the DVD drive letter.

You have now successfully changed your DVD drive letter in Windows 10.

How to change the recovery drive letter in Windows 10

Changing your recovery drive will only take a few seconds. Like before, follow the instructions shown above to quickly change your recovery drive letter.

How to change the boot drive letter in Windows 10

Unfortunately, it is not possible to change the boot drive letter in Windows through Desk Management.

We only recommend changing your boot drive in case of emergency. Otherwise, you should not make any changes to your boot drive. If you make a wrong move, you may not be able to run your system properly. For that reason, carefully follow the steps we provide. You should also make a system backup before continuing.

Below we will explain how to swap drive letters C and D. To assign another letter to your C drive, you must rename the \DosDevice\letter: value to another letter that is not already in use.

Also, before messing with the Registry, it is a good idea to create a copy of the Registry before editing it.

1. Start writing “Registry Editor”In the search bar and open it.
2. Now, navigate to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\MountedDevices.
   
3. Click on Mounted devices.
   
4. Go to Security menu and click Permissions.
   
5. Verify that you have full control as an administrator.
   
6. Close Registry Editor, wait a few seconds, and then open it again.
7. Again, navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\MountedDevices.
   
8. Find the new letter for your drive. Find \DosDevice\C: and right click on it.
   
9. Click Rename.
10. Rename the file to a new drive letter \DosDevices\Z:. This will empty your C partition.
11. Locate the drive whose letter you want to change. Find \DosDevice\D:. Right click on it and click Rename.
12. Rename the new drive letter \DosDevice\C:.
13. Choose the appropriate value for \DosDevices\Z: and click Rename.
14. Change the name to \DosDevices\D:.
15. Close Regedit and open it again.
16. Change the administrator permission settings to Read only.
17. Restart your PC.

You have now successfully changed your boot drive letter in Windows 10.

Additional FAQs

Is it safe to change drive letters?

Changing drive letters is not a problem in itself. But if your computer needs to run a file written to that same drive, you may have a problem. It is not for any reason that Windows warns you before changing a drive letter.

It is generally not recommended to change drive letters unless it helps solve a specific problem. For example, if your Windows Explorer doesn’t recognize an external device with a certain driver, it’s okay to change its name.

There are some units whose letters you can change without consequences. For example, to a partition that has files that you rarely use. In addition, you can change the letter of an external drive without problems.

Change drive letters in Windows 10

In this article, we have given you some useful tips on how to change drive letters in Windows 10. Remember, do this only if strictly necessary as it could cause some applications on your computer to not run properly.

Have you ever had to change your drive letters for any specific reason? Did you have any problems? Share your experiences in the comments section below.