All Files on PC are Read Only: 4 Easy Ways to Change Them

Some of the most reliable solutions

3 min. read

Updated onOctober 4, 2023

updated onOctober 4, 2023

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Key notes

A read-only document can’t be edited, but what if all your documents are set to read-only? This can be a problem we will tackle in today’s article.

This is how one user described the issue onSuperuserforums:

Restarting my computer one day, most of myfilesin my folders were switched to read-only. I’ve changed the permissions to allow everyone full control, as well as going through each user.

While read-only files can be helpful, sometimes your documents can become read-only, which can be an issue. In this article, we’ll try to show you how to fix this problem.

Why are all of my files read-only?

Here are a few reasons why all of your files might be marked as read-only. A few possible reasons could be the following:

What can I do if all files are read-only?

1. Change the file properties

2. Change permissions

3. Delete recently added software

Since a non-compatible application may trigger this problem, uninstalling your recently added apps may resolve it.

4. Scan for virus

There you go, four quick and easy solutions that should help you if all your files areread-only.

Note that we have not written these solutions in any particular order and expect you to try what seems the most applicable in your case.

We are, however, curious to know what worked for you. So please leave us a comment below.

All Files on PC are Read Only: 4 Easy Ways to Change Them#

Why are all of my files read-only?#

What can I do if all files are read-only?#

1. Change the file properties#

2. Change permissions#

3. Delete recently added software#

4. Scan for virus#