Folder behaviour

JAK · May 4, 2026

I have a several folders with MP3 files, but one particular folder is extremley slow to populate, doing a search or even clicking on the header bar to sort by title / artist etc. always takes ages.

it only happens on one particular folder. i have renamed the folder, created a new one and moved all the files to it, but still these issues remain.

is there a likely reason for this ? and hopefully a solution.

thank you in advance

neemobeer · May 4, 2026

Are there a lot of files in the folder?

Slavic · May 4, 2026

It may be caused by only one particular file. I would try to split all the files in this folder in half, check where is longest open time between two, then split that part in half etc..

P.S. Some sound files may have additional metadata, including URL links. They are useful to show real thumbnails, but also may cause delays because of Internet connection. Additional delay may be a result of antivirus checking.

OAT · May 4, 2026

JAK said:
I have a several folders with MP3 files, but one particular folder is extremley slow to populate, doing a search or even clicking on the header bar to sort by title / artist etc. always takes ages.

thank you in advance

How to Speed Up File Explorer in Windows 11

To speed up File Explorer on Windows 11, apply the mixed content template to all folders, or press F11 to switch it to full-screen mode.

winaero.com

This will involve registry manipulation.

Eksy61 · May 5, 2026

Use CHKDSK or some equivalent third-party program to scan that storage drive for errors and fix those if needed.

JAK · May 5, 2026

Eksy61, doesn't matter what drive the folder is on, whatever the problem it seems to get transferred if the folder is copied to another HDD

JAK · May 5, 2026

Neemobeer, it varies, was 500 now 800

pepanee · May 6, 2026

JAK:
Slavic has a really good suggestion. It is most likely one file that's causing this issue.
Make a new folder on your Desktop and call it: Test Folder
Copy all the mp3s into that folder, this will be the test folder.
Take half the files, and put them in a new folder. See which folder lags. Delete the mp3s from the folder that does NOT lag.
Now split the files in half and move them to the empty folder. See which folder lags. Do this process until you can narrow it down to hopefully only one file, not multiple files.

WiseTomCat · May 6, 2026

it might have to do with the "view" option in file explorer where the explorer recognized files are mp3 and applies a detailed view with tags:Album, artists etc which takes time to fetch.

Just right click on an empty space and change the view to List and it should be good.
Viewing in "Tiles" can also be problem for media files

Edit: Also make sure to sort by Name in ascending order. Sorting by date takes a long time to load everytime even with the fastest SSD.

JAK · May 9, 2026

ok split into 2 folders 400 each, but sorting by title or date results in a whirring symbol for ages, other folders ok, one with 1200 mp3 files

pepanee · May 9, 2026

Keep doing that process with the laggy folder:
Make two folders, and split them in half, and see which folder is laggy. Keep doing that process until you can figure out which file is specifically doing the folder lag.
Process of elimination.

JAK · May 9, 2026

But the 2 folders I split are both laggy, so it's unlikely a file issue

pepanee · May 9, 2026

Both folders probably have at least one file in there that's lagging them. Try splitting the artists/albums separately into folders, and see if you can narrow it down.

JAK · May 12, 2026

Split it into 2 folders both laggy so not going to prove anything

OAT · May 12, 2026

JAK said:
Split it into 2 folders both laggy so not going to prove anything

Shot in the dark,
Are you viewing content using thumbnails?
Are there really long file names?
Are there unusual characters in some file names, such as multiple dots, quotes etc. ?

JAK · May 12, 2026

None of the above unfortunately

rick99 · May 12, 2026

Try mp3tag to view all the .mp3 in that folder. You may be able to see if a couple of the files have something unusual in one of the tags. There are many tag fields... or even tag versions.

JAK · May 13, 2026

Some of the extended tags are different, but moving these out of the folder made no difference, I noticed that if I open the problem folder then close it and open another, then return to the problem folder, it behaves normally, just one of those windows 11 abnormalities I expect.

giftwrapped · May 13, 2026

@JAK, did you try the F11 trick in post #4?

Interestingly, this trick of pressing F11 twice to speed up File Explorer works in all builds of Windows 11, including 23H2.

I had the same problem as you, and in the end I got tired and disabled automatic folder type discovery . My solution was to do the registry changes in #4 -- it works for Windows 11 as well.
So now all my Windows Explorer windows are shown in "View > Details".
Sorting by artist, album, song title, year, etc. now has to be done in my music player (foobar2000), and I am fine with that

Edit: And of course all my songs are properly tagged.

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