Drive letter missing in Windows File Explorer

At times one may come across points where the Drive letter missing in Windows File Explorer after you have installed an update, most commonly. If this is that case with you, then here is something that can help you. In this article, we are sharing the methods to fix the Drive letter missing in Windows File Explorer issue on Windows by 3 methods.

What is Drive Letter?

If you are wondering what a Drive letter is, then it is a single Alphabetic character, from A-Z, that can be assigned to either of the three – Physical disk partition, Removable device/ CD-ROM/ mapping network drive in the computer and Floppy disk drive.

What if the Drive Letter is missing?

If you are getting questions on why this Drive Letter missing is such a big deal, the let me tell you, the drive letter C: is assigned to the first disk partition where the running Windows is installed. And if this letter is missing either from the Disk Management or the Windows File explorer then it may result in inaccessibility of the partition.  Here is what you can do if the Drive file is missing –

Drive letter missing in Windows File Explorer

Drive letter missing in Windows File Explorer

To deal with the Drive letter missing, here are the three methods that you can use to get the Drive letter back.

Assign the letter via a Registry tweak

  • To begin with, Launch the Registry Editor and go to-

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\MountedDevices

  • Check if a device is shown as being mounted at the specific drive letter.
  • Now right-click the drive letter that you want and select “Rename” from the right-click menu to alter the letter to any other letter that is not used.

Manually Show Missing Drive Letters

Drive letter missing in Windows File Explorer

  • Go to the Start Search and look for Folder options.
  • Then Click on the ‘View‘ tab.
  • Now go below to the ‘Show Drive Letter‘ option and check the box in front of it.
  • Click on the Apply option and then select OK.
  • Go back to ‘this PC’ Window and you will see the drive letters are visible here.

Ensure your drive has a drive letter assigned in Disk Management

Drive letter missing in Windows File Explorer

In the Disk Management, every Drive assigned is a Drive letter. Follow the steps below to get the missing drive letter back.

When you right click on the partition I.e. volume, you get an option – ‘Change Drive Letter and Paths’. This option helps you to add, change or remove the Drive letters.

If you click on the option of Remove, the Drive letter of the target drive will be removed and disappear in Disk Management.

Now that the issue here is the drive missing, you will have to choose the option of add the drive. Just note that it is crucial that you add the same letter as that of the original letter, as the programs may not run as usual.

In case the original letter is taken by a new drive, alter the letter of the new drive to another available letter and then allocate the released letter for the target drive.

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