How big is Windows 10? Or how much space does Windows 10 take up? Perhaps you are wondering about Windows 10 install size before installing this operating system. From this post, you can find the answer. As well, MiniTool Solution will give you some tips to reduce the disk space of Windows 10.
Nowadays Windows 10 is a very popular operating system. Because of its strong safety and powerful features, many users all over the world have upgraded to this OS. You may not be an exception and plan to install Windows 10 on your computer.
Before you do, it makes sense to look at the minimum amount of storage it requires, particularly if the hard drive doesn’t have much capacity (it may be 128GB). Unless there is sufficient disk space on your computer disk, many storage issues may occur frequently when having a Windows operating system that doesn’t have much free disk space left.
In consideration of that, the best way is to guarantee that the computer has enough space to run the OS and as well as make sure the available space for storing personal files and programs.
Now, let’s cut to the chase and see what Windows 10 install size is.
How Big Is Windows 10?
So, how much space does Windows 10 take up on your computer?
When Windows 10 was released firstly, even it was smaller than Windows 8. The minimum storage requirement for a 32-bit system is 16 GB while 20 GB for a 64-bit system. In the beginning, this storage is effective but now this status has changed and Windows 10 size has been increasing.
Since Windows 10 May 2019 Update, a big change comes out. Microsoft increases the installation size to 32GB for both 32-bit and 64-bit versions. This is mainly because the update process of Windows 10 has been changed.
Before May 2019 Update, Windows 10 started downloading and installing only when there was enough storage space on the host device. Or else, you get an error message saying “We can’t tell if your PC has enough space to continue installing Windows 10”.
On the other hand, Windows 10 version 1903 update reserves 7 GB of disk space that is specially used to download and install updates to make sure no fault occurs during the installation process. To know more information, refer to this post – Microsoft Reserves 7GB of Disk Space for Windows 10 Updates.
Related Windows 10 Install Size FAQs
You may wonder about not only the installation size of Windows 10 but also Windows 10 size in other aspects, for example, Windows 10 install size USB and size of Windows 10 ISO.
What size USB do you need for Windows 10 install?
If you want to use a USB flash drive to install Windows 10, the drive should be at least 16GB, but the best is 32GB of storage space.
How big is Windows 10 ISO?
The size of Windows 10 ISO is approximately 3-4 GB. After getting an ISO file from the Internet, you can create bootable media and use the drive to install Windows 10. A related article is recommended here – How to Create Bootable USB from ISO Windows 10 for Clean Install.
How to Reduce Windows 10 Install Size
This may be what you concern about. After installing Windows 10, you can take some measures to reduce the installation size of the operating system on your computer.
Turn off Hibernation
Hiberfil.sys is the hibernation storage file that saves the primary settings of your system to quickly restore the PC from hibernation. The amount of RAM impacts the size of your hiberfil.sys file. That is, the more RAM is, the more hiberfil.sys files are and the more disk space taken by these files is.
To turn off hibernation, run Command Prompt as administrator, then use the command powercfg /hibernate off and press Enter. To re-enable it, use powercfg /hibernate on.
Delete Windows.old
After installing Windows 10 on your computer, there may be a folder called Windows.old that allows you to restore to the previous version of Windows in case of a system crash. The folder always takes up a lot of disk space. You can delete Windows.old to free up space.
In addition, you can try some other ways to save disk space, for example, uninstall some applications, change the size of the virtual memory, delete temporary files, etc. In this post, more information is introduced – How Much Space Does Windows 10 Take up and How to Extend Space.
Final Words
After reading this post, you clearly know what Windows 10 install size is. Also, you can take action to save some disk space after finishing the installation. If you have any ideas, let us know in the comment part below.