This article explains the steps one can take to locate and save Windows Spotlight images in Windows 11.
Windows Spotlight lets users set up their desktop background and lock screen to automatically connect to Microsoft servers to discover and download random images from around the world.
Similar to what you see on the Bing search page, some images are beautiful. Unfortunately, windows stores these images on one’s computer but doesn’t make it easy to use them.
If you want to use these images in other ways, the steps below show you how to grab these from the cached location and save them into a folder of your choosing.
Locate and save Windows Spotlight images in Windows 11
As described above, some Windows Spotlight images are beautiful and worth keeping. Windows stores these images on one’s computer but doesn’t make it easy to use.
Below is how to locate and use them.
First, open the Windows Terminal app, and select the Command Prompt tab.
When the terminal app opens, run the commands below to create a sub-folder called WindowsSpotlightImages in the Pictures folder in your home directory.
md "%UserProfile%\Pictures\WindowsSpotlightImages"
Next, copy saved copies of the Spotlight images from their location and copy them over to the new WindowsSpotlightImges folder.
copy "%LocalAppData%\Packages\Microsoft.Windows.ContentDeliveryManager_cw5n1h2txyewy\LocalState\Assets\*.*" "%UserProfile%\Pictures\WindowsSpotlightImages"
When you run the commands above, you should get a successful message that all the images were copied over.
Next, change into the WindowsSpotlightImages folder by running the commands below.
cd "%UserProfile%\Pictures\WindowsSpotlightImages"
Finally, run the commands below to rename all the images as JPEG.
ren * *.jpg
When you browse your Picture folder, you should see a WindowsSpotlightImages folder. Inside, you will see all images copied over as JPEG or JPG.
That should do it!
Conclusion:
This post showed you how to locate and use Windows Spotlight images in Windows 11. Please use the comment form below if you find any errors above or have something to add.
