Windows explorer very slow (green bar)

My windows explorer used to be very fast. Then I tried to decompress a zip file, and cancel it.
Now it is very slow.

symptoms:

-When I press (Windows)+E nothing happens until some minutes later (before it opened winosw explorer instantly)

-when explorer is open I can see the folder icons only. The rest are just white squares. (the icons of all other files take time to open)

-the green bar in the upper side shows a very slow progress.

-If I right click a file, the menu does not appear but a blue circle (loading) appears instead

The computer is not slow, and I can browse internet and doing other things. Only everything related to explorer is slow

Any help is greatly appreciated

Today, File Explorer started taking a couple of minutes to open. After reading many suggestions, I opted for the simplest. In FileExplorer>QuickAccess. Right click>Options. Turned off Quick Access for folders and files. I rarely use Quick Access to open files anyway.

What seems to have happened is that I've been working with large Excel files today (more than usual opened in one day). As soon as I stopped Quick Access from placing all those large files 'at-the-ready, File Explorer began opening at usual speed.

May not be the solution for everyone, but it worked for me.