Where are 'Favorites' and 'Recent places' in file explorer?

Much as I like Windows 10 (despite an unnecessarily difficult installation), I'm horrified to find that they have apparently abandoned the 'Favorites' and 'Recent places' folders - which I used constantly and had grown to love.


Are they hiding them somewhere? Is there a way to restore/find them? Have I missed something obvious?


(I can't believe that they would be so stupid as to get rid of them: 'recent files' and 'Frequent folders' are good, but not quite as useful...).

They are both in "Quick Access" the first item on the Navigation Pane.
Expand "Quick Access" to get your Links, Click on "Quick Access" to get your "Frequent" Places and Recent Items.

Frequent Folders is Frequent Places.

But "frequent folders" is not the same as RECENT folders. This is ruining my work life. Does anyone know of a way to get recent folders back?

In Windows 8 the item you are talking about is Frequent Places and in Frequent Folders in Windows 10 is it. Just a name change.

Aside, right-click on Explorers taskbar icon, pull up its jumplist. You'll find recent files and folders.

in Edge you can access them from the menu top right..
you can sort them how you wish by holding down on the mouse button and dragging them up or down the list
- the newer additions go in at the bottom of the list..

logicearth said:

In Windows 8 the item you are talking about is Frequent Places and in Frequent Folders in Windows 10 is it. Just a name change.

Aside, right-click on Explorers taskbar icon, pull up its jumplist. You'll find recent files and folders.

On my Win10 installations (clean install of Win10 Home on notebook, updgrade install of Win 10 Pro on desktop), <right-click> on Explorer's taskbar icon only displays the items in my Quick Access list. And, only the first ten*, at that. It's not a true "recent files" or "recent folders" list like in previous Windows versions.

*Off topic, but Win10 seems to abandoned user control over how many jump list items can be displayed on taskbar icons. It's hard-wired at ten items?

You said:

For favorites, you right click a folder and click "Pin to quick access".
For recent files and folders, pin this to quick access: %appdata%\Microsoft\Windows\Recent

How do you pin that to quick access? That address does not do anything for me in windows explorer. I have recent files in the "Quick Access" but not recent folders.

logicearth said:

In Windows 8 the item you are talking about is Frequent Places and in Frequent Folders in Windows 10 is it. Just a name change.

Aside, right-click on Explorers taskbar icon, pull up its jumplist. You'll find recent files and folders.

It is not just a name change - there is "frequent folders" and "recent files" --- there is not "recent folders"

There are only a few folders when you right click on the taskbar icon - previous Windows had a longer list under the "Recent Places" folder

jsmonroe said:

How do you pin that to quick access? That address does not do anything for me in windows explorer. I have recent files in the "Quick Access" but not recent folders.

I've done this to get Recent Items to show up in Quick Access and in Windows Explorer Jump List

1. In Windows Explorer, navigate to "%appdata%\Microsoft\Windows\Recent Items" without the quotes
   
   
2. In Windows Explorer, make sure the Navigation Pane is visible. If it's not, go to the Menu Bar and select View -> Navigation Pane and put a checkmark next to Navigation Pane.
3. In Windows Explorer, go to the Menu Bar and select Home -> Pin to Quick Access:
   
   
4. The "Recent items" folder will appear in the Navigation Pane, and you can drag it to the top of the Quick access list if you desire.

This should also put Recent items at the top of the Windows Explorer Jump List, and in the Start Menu -> File Explorer -> Pinned list.