How to Delete Windows Update Files in Windows 10?

About Windows update files in Windows 10

When your C drive is running out of space, you will probably use Disk Cleanup to free up space. There's a "Windows Update Cleanup" category that seems tied to the system-related data. Is it safe to delete these files? Where are they stored? Let's continue to learn more.

🔄What are Windows update files?

Windows update files are like packages of improvements for your computer, with .exe for big changes and .cab for small fixes. Microsoft's Windows Update service automatically puts them in C:\Windows, taking up several GBs of space. They keep your system updated. After updates, old files stay as backups. But these old files can continuously use up storage space over time. Simply put, here’s a table:

Windows update files are packages from Microsoft that improve your system:

File Type	Purpose	Extension	Location
Executable	Major updates	.exe	C:\Windows
Cabinet	Minor fixes	.cab	C:\Windows
Backup Files	Old system versions post-update	(varied)	C:\Windows, WinSxS, etc.

🧹Is it safe to delete Windows Update Cleanup in Disk Cleanup?

Usually, it's safe to delete old and unnecessary update files as long as your system is stable with the updates. Windows Update Cleanup aims for files no longer needed, like old system versions and cached updates. But, be cautious about removing Windows ESD Installation Files in Disk Cleanup. These files are tied to the "Reset this PC" feature, which lets you restore your computer to factory settings. If you delete them, "Reset this PC" might not work properly. If you do not know what to delete in Windows Disk Cleanup, you can click to learn relevant information. In short, you can refer to this table:

Item	Can Delete?	Notes
Windows Update Cleanup	✅ Safe	Removes old update files no longer needed. Frees up space.
Windows ESD Installation Files	⚠️ Caution	Needed for "Reset this PC". Deleting may break the reset function.

✅ If your system is working fine after updates, it's usually safe to remove update cleanup files.

⚠️ When unsure what to delete in Disk Cleanup, click each item for details before confirming.

3 ways to delete Windows update files in Windows 10

Here, we will share 3 built-in Windows tools to help you remove them and free up space on your computer. However, these methods require you to manually find and delete the Windows 10 update files. If you prefer a more modern and effective solution, you can skip directly to the section.

Method 1. Use Disk Cleanup to delete Windows update files Windows 10

How to delete Windows update? It is a direct way to delete Windows update files on Disk Cleanup. In this utility, you can also clear data like Temporary Internet Files, Downloaded Program Files, Recycle Bin, Thumbnails, and so on. Just with 2 steps, you can delete Windows update files to free up storage space.

Step 1. Hit “Win+R” to input “cleanmgr.exe”. Click “OK”

Step 2. Find “ Windows Update Cleanup” and check it.

Method 2. Delete Windows 10 update files via Settings

Windows 11 and 10 have the tool named “Windows Update Cleanup” tool in Settings. The updated files and other temporary files on your PC can be found here. 

Step 1. Press “Win+I” to open Settings, and choose “System” >”Storage”

Step 2. Select “Temporary Files”, check “Windows Update Cleanup” and “Delivery Optimization Files” in the pop-up window. After checking, click “ Remove Files” button

Method 3. Delete Windows update files Windows 10 with SoftwareDistribution Folder

The last method to delete update files in Windows 10 via the Windows built-in tool is easy. Sometimes, when the Windows updates stagnate or not be downloaded entirely, the update files will be stored in the folder temporarily, deleting them or stopping the automatic storage won't trigger any major problem. Therefore, it is advisable to stop the service first to avoid storing.

Step 1. Type “Services” in the search box, and click the icon.

Step 2. Find “Windows Update” service, and right-click it. Choose “Stop”

🔥How to quickly and effectively delete Windows updates?

If you want to remove Windows update files effectively without manually searching and deleting them, AOMEI Partition Assistant is an ideal choice. This disk management tool offers various options to clean up your PC—including, but not limited to, Windows update files, junk files, and other unnecessary data that take up your PC space.

Fix 1. Run PC Cleaner

When using Disk Cleanup, the multitude of files can be puzzling, and it's hard to determine what's safe to delete. Mistakes could lead to data loss or system crashes. To safely and easily clean up your computer to free up space, it is recommended to use user-friendly software, such as AOMEI Partition Assistant. It is a trusted and free tool designed to help clean your PC and free up space across all your hard drives. It helps keep your computer running smoothly by removing unnecessary files and managing disk space more efficiently.

Step 1. Download and open AOMEI, you can see all the PC disks and partitions in the interface, click "Free up" and "PC Cleaner".

Step 2. You can know the free space you can get with the tip "Approximate 1.26 GB disk space you can free up", click "Start Scan".

Step 3. You're in the process to scan all junk files in the target drive.

Step 4. All junk files will be listed, select the target junk files and click "Clean All".

Step 5. When all the junk files are deleted, click "Back".

Fix 2. Automatically detect and delete large files

AOMEI Partition Assistant has a variety of solutions available. The another notable feature is "Delete Large Files," which can automatically scan files larger than 16MB, display them for you, and permit the removal of around 1,000 files at a time. To ensure safety, certain files are marked in red, indicating they're not recommended for deletion. Should an inadvertent deletion occur, it will prompt you to manually select files, confirm the action again, and then proceed.

AOMEI Partition Assistant allows you to delete large files even you can't delete in Disk Cleanup.

If you accidentally delete anything important, you can run its Recover Data function to recover it. This powerful feature supports recovering permanently deleted files from PC.

Step 1. Open the AOMEI Partition Assistant, select “Free up”, and choose “Delete Large Files” as the picture shows.

Step 2. Choose the target disks to scan, and click “Start Scan”

Step 3. All the scanned files will be listed in this step. Choose the files you want to delete but pay more attention to the files in red. Then click “Delete”.

Step 4. Here it summarizes the target deleting files for you. You can clearly find how much the space it releases. After confirmation, select “Delete Now”.

If you have deleted Windows update files Windows 10, but still find the C drive release little space, you can try the function of allocating free space. It allows you to directly allocate free space from other partitions to extend the target partition space without data loss.

Conclusion

In this passage, we share the methods like using Disk Cleanup, Settings, and SoftwareDistribution Folder to delete Windows 10 update files. But when you ask how to delete Windows 10 update files, you aim to free up more space to enhance your computer performance.

The powerful tool AOMEI Partition Assistant can help you to do that. Furthermore, you can also enjoy other advanced features of the software, such as moving applications to another drive, migrating OS to SSD, or merging partitions, etc. to make full use of your storage space. For Windows server users, you can choose Server Edition to manage your computer effectively.