This tutorial will show you how to view the size of a folder, and all of its contents, in Windows Explorer.
Please note: This guide was originally published back in 2007. The software outlined in this guide not only still exists, but now also works in Windows 7 and 8, and probably even Windows 10.
- Start by downloading FolderSize, which is not only free, but open source – and available in 32 and 64bit versions (if you’re not sure which use, check out this guide on how to determine if you’re using a 32 or 64 bit version of Windows). To install, you’ll click next a few times, OK once or twice, and then it’s done. Now open an instance of Windows Explorer and select View -> Details.
- Right-click one of the column titles (Size, Type, Date Modified – it doesn’t matter) and select Folder Size.
- Now you’ll have a column that displays the size of the contents of each folder.
- You may want to remove the Size column, as it’s now made a bit redundant. To do so, just right-click one of the column titles, and remove the check from the Size entry.
- Drag the Folder Size column to wherever you want it to appear in Windows Explorer (the order it appears vs. your other columns).
- Folder Size even includes a set of preferences you can set from the Control Panel.
- For example – you can switch to Compact which makes calculating the size of a folder even easier (particularly a large folder).
- The Service tab of the Folder Size lets you start and stop Folder Size – you can even pause it if you’re doing hard disk intensive operations and don’t want Folder Size to slow things down.
- If you’re happy with Folder Size, you can make sure that Windows Explorer always uses your new ‘view’ by following the instructions in this brief tutorial.
