Resetting Default App Settings in Windows 11 & 10: Reset All Default Apps

To reset default apps in Windows 11, open Settings → Apps → Default apps, scroll to the bottom, and click Reset next to Reset all default apps. In Windows 10 it is Settings → Apps → Default apps → Reset to the Microsoft recommended defaults. Either way, every file type and link type goes back to the app Windows picked out of the box, for your account only, with no restart. What does "reset default apps" actually do? It changes which app opens a file. It does not uninstall anything, delete settings inside your apps, or touch your files. And here is the part almost nobody is told: if you keep seeing "An app default was reset", Windows is not losing your choice by accident. It is deliberately undoing a change it believes an app made behind your back.

Jake found that out over a week of PDFs. He set Adobe Acrobat as the app for PDF files, and twice that week his PDFs opened in Edge again with a little notification about a default being reset. He assumed Windows was broken. Ethan, who looks after the PCs at Jake's shop, recognized it in one look: a PDF tool Jake had installed was trying to grab the PDF association the unofficial way, and Windows was throwing that change out. Ethan's own reason for knowing all this is the opposite job: when he sets up a shop PC, he wants every file type to open in the right app on day one, for every staff member, without clicking through Settings eight times. This page covers both: resetting everything, resetting one type, and making the reset stick.

Not sure which of those you need? Read the next section; it takes a minute and saves resetting more than you meant to.

What "reset default apps" does, and what it does not

A default app is the app Windows uses when you open something without choosing: double-click a PDF, a photo or a song, click a web link in an email, or open a mailto: address. Windows keeps a list for your account that pairs every file type (.pdf, .jpg, .mp3, .docx) and every link type (http, https, mailto) with an app.

"Reset all default apps" wipes your choices from that list and puts Microsoft's recommended choices back. In practice, on a typical Windows 11 PC that means:

• Web links and HTML files open in Microsoft Edge.
• PDFs open in Microsoft Edge.
• Photos open in Photos.
• Music and video open in Media Player.
• Email links open in Outlook (the new Outlook app on current builds).
• Office documents keep opening in Office if it is installed, because Office registers itself as the recommended app for its own types.

What it does not do, because these are the fears that stop people pressing the button:

• It does not uninstall Chrome, Acrobat, VLC or anything else. They stay installed; they just stop being the automatic choice.
• It does not delete bookmarks, passwords, playlists or any settings inside those apps.
• It does not touch your files.
• It does not affect other people's accounts on the same PC. Defaults are per user.

So "what does reset all default apps mean" has a short answer: it is a do-over for "which app opens what", and nothing more. If only one or two file types are wrong, you usually do not need it at all; fixing just those types is quicker and keeps the rest of your choices.

Which app opens what after a reset, and how to change it back

Before you press the button, here is what to expect on a typical Windows 11 PC, and the one place to put each choice back afterward. Windows 10 follows the same pattern, with Groove or Movies & TV on older installs where Windows 11 uses Media Player.

You open	After a reset it opens in	To change it back
Web links, .htm, .html	Microsoft Edge	Default apps → your browser → Set default
.pdf	Microsoft Edge	Default apps → type .pdf → pick your PDF app
.jpg, .png, .heic	Photos	Default apps → your photo app → each type
.mp3, .mp4, .mkv	Media Player	Default apps → your player (VLC and so on) → each type
mailto: links	Outlook (new)	Default apps → type mailto → pick your mail app
.docx, .xlsx, .pptx	Word, Excel, PowerPoint if Office is installed	Usually nothing to do
.zip	File Explorer	Default apps → type .zip → pick 7-Zip or WinRAR

The browser line is the one almost everyone changes back first, so do that right after the reset and the rest can wait until a file opens in the wrong place.

How to reset all default apps in Windows 11

1. Press Win + I to open Settings.
2. Click Apps in the left column, then Default apps.
3. Scroll all the way to the bottom of the page. Under Related settings you will see Reset all default apps.
4. Click Reset next to it. On recent builds a small confirmation appears; confirm it.
5. A check mark appears beside the Reset button when it is done. Nothing restarts.

Then set back the one or two apps you actually want. Most people reset everything and immediately make their browser the default again; the default browser guide walks through that, including the "Set default" button Windows 11 now shows at the top of a browser's page.

How to reset default apps in Windows 10

1. Press Win + I and open Apps.
2. Click Default apps in the left column.
3. Scroll down to Reset to the Microsoft recommended defaults and click Reset.
4. A check mark appears next to the button. Your Email, Maps, Music, Photos, Video and Web browser tiles at the top of the page now show the Microsoft apps.

Windows 10 shows the six big categories at the top of the same page, so you can put back Chrome or VLC from there in one click each. The photos app guide and the music player guide cover those two in detail.

Reset default apps by file type (just PDFs, just images)

This is the better tool most of the time, and "reset default apps by file type" is one of the most searched versions of the question for a reason: usually only one association is wrong.

Windows 11

1. Settings → Apps → Default apps.
2. In the box at the top labeled Set a default for a file type or link type, type the extension, for example .pdf.
3. The current app appears under it. Click it and choose the app you want from the list. If yours is not listed, choose Choose an app on your PC and browse to its .exe; the Program Files guide helps find it.
4. Click Set default.

You can also go the other way round: on the same Default apps page, click an app's name in the list (say, VLC) to see every file type it can open, and change each one there. That is the quickest way to hand all video types to one player.

Windows 10

Settings → Apps → Default apps → Choose default apps by file type. A long list of extensions appears with the current app beside each. Click the app next to the extension you want to change and pick a new one. Choose default apps by protocol, just below, does the same for link types such as mailto.

The right-click route, both versions

Right-click any file of that type → Open with → Choose another app. Pick the app, then check the option to always use it (labeled Always in Windows 11, Always use this app to open .pdf files in Windows 10). This is the fastest fix of all when you are looking at the file that opened wrong.

There is no button to "reset just this one type to the Microsoft choice"; you simply choose the Microsoft app (Edge, Photos, Media Player) for that type. The result is identical.

Why do my default apps keep resetting? "An app default was reset"

This is Jake's week, and the most frustrating version of the problem. You choose an app, and later a notification says "An app default was reset. An app caused a problem with the default app setting for .pdf files, so it's been reset to Microsoft Edge." Or your choices simply revert after a reboot. It looks like Windows forgetting. It is Windows refusing.

Since Windows 8, your choice for each file type is stored with a protection hash that only Windows itself can compute when you make the choice through Settings or the Open with dialog. When an app tries to make itself the default by writing the association directly, which many installers and "make me default" buttons used to do, the hash does not match. Windows treats the entry as tampering, throws it out, and restores the recommended app. The notification is that event. Since the February 2024 updates (KB5034765 for Windows 11, KB5034763 for Windows 10), a driver called the UserChoice Protection Driver goes further for three of the most fought-over associations, http, https and .pdf, and blocks programs from writing them at all.

So the fix is not to fight Windows; it is to set the default the supported way and stop the app that keeps trying:

1. Set the default yourself in Settings (by file type, above). A choice made there carries a valid hash and sticks.
2. Find the app that is grabbing it. The notification names the file type; think about which app wants it. PDF editors, browsers, media players and "PC optimizers" are the usual suspects. Open that app's own settings and turn off any option like Check if this is the default or Make default on startup.
3. Update or reinstall the app. Current versions of major apps use the supported Windows prompt instead of writing the association directly. An old version may still do it the old way at every launch.
4. Remove what you do not need. If a tool you never use keeps winning the fight, uninstalling it ends the notifications.
5. After a big update, check once. A feature update can occasionally reset some defaults, especially for browsers and PDFs. If the reset coincided with an update and nothing else, set your choices again; if a specific update keeps doing it, the update removal guide shows how to back it out while you wait for a fix.

For Jake, step 2 was the answer: a free PDF tool he had tried once was set to reclaim PDFs every time it updated. He turned that option off, set Acrobat in Settings, and the notifications stopped.

Reset default apps vs reset an app vs reset Windows

Three different buttons share the word "reset", and choosing the wrong one is how people lose more than they meant to. Here is the difference in one table:

Button	Where	What it changes	What you lose
Reset all default apps	Settings → Apps → Default apps	Which app opens each file and link type	Only your "open with" choices
Reset (one app)	Settings → Apps → Installed apps → app → Advanced options (Windows 10: Apps & features)	That app's own data, as if freshly installed	The app's settings and sign-in; for some apps, offline content
Repair (one app)	Same Advanced options page	Fixes the app's files	Nothing; try this before Reset
Reset this PC	Settings → System → Recovery	Reinstalls Windows	All apps, and your files unless you choose Keep my files

The Reset and Repair buttons on Advanced options appear only for apps installed from the Microsoft Store and a few built-in apps; desktop programs such as Chrome or Acrobat have their own repair options in their installers or settings. If Edge is the app misbehaving, it has its own reset settings option inside the browser. None of these change your default apps, and resetting default apps changes none of them.

Reset default apps with PowerShell or the command line

People search for "reset default apps Windows 11 PowerShell" expecting a one-line cmdlet. There is no built-in cmdlet that resets all defaults for the signed-in user, and that is deliberate: the hash protection above exists precisely so scripts cannot silently change your choices. What the command line can do:

• Open the right Settings page directly, which is handy in a support script: start ms-settings:defaultapps
• See what the current defaults are, exported to a file, from an administrator Command Prompt or PowerShell (the CMD as administrator guide shows how to open one):
  dism /online /Export-DefaultAppAssociations:"%UserProfile%\Desktop\MyDefaults.xml"
• Remove a custom association file that was imported into Windows (by you or an IT department), so new profiles get Microsoft's defaults again:
  dism /online /Remove-DefaultAppAssociations

The last command does not reset your existing account; it removes the custom set that new accounts would inherit. For your own account, the Settings button remains the supported route, and it takes ten seconds.

For IT admins: setting and resetting default apps for every user

Ethan's shop PCs are the use case here: you want PDFs, browsers and mail to open in your chosen apps for every user, including people who sign in for the first time next month.

1. Configure one reference PC the way you want, signed in as a test user, using Settings.
2. Export the associations from an elevated prompt:
   dism /online /Export-DefaultAppAssociations:C:\Deploy\AppAssoc.xml
3. Trim the XML to just the types you care about (.pdf, http, https, .htm, .html, mailto, and so on). A short file is easier to audit and less likely to fight with apps you did not mean to touch.
4. Deploy it one of two ways:
   • Image or new users only: dism /online /Import-DefaultAppAssociations:C:\Deploy\AppAssoc.xml, or /Image: against an offline image. It applies to each user at first sign-in and never touches existing profiles.
   • Every user, every sign-in: Group Policy Computer Configuration → Administrative Templates → Windows Components → File Explorer → Set a default associations configuration file, pointing at the XML on a share or local path. In Intune, the equivalent is the ApplicationDefaults DefaultAssociationsConfiguration policy with the XML base64-encoded.

With the policy, the associations are reapplied at every sign-in, which also cures the "keeps resetting" complaints because your file wins each time. If you want users to be able to change a type afterward, add Suggested="true" to that association in the XML; the policy then sets it once and leaves user changes alone. To undo it all: remove the policy, run dism /online /Remove-DefaultAppAssociations for the imported set, and have users click Reset all default apps once.

Two traps. Scripts and third-party tools that write UserChoice keys directly stopped working for http, https and .pdf when the UserChoice Protection Driver arrived in February 2024; use the policy route above rather than disabling that protection fleet-wide. And the XML references apps by their registered ProgId, so the app must be installed on the target PC before the association can apply; deploy the app first, then the policy.

Jake's PDFs have opened in Acrobat for a month now, and he has stopped dreading the notification, because he knows what it is telling him. Ethan's shop PCs open everything in the right app for whoever signs in, set once from a short file. The reset button is not a risk and it is not a repair for a broken PC; it is a clean slate for one list. Use it when the list is a mess, use the by-file-type option when one entry is wrong, and when Windows says a default was reset, know that it was standing up for the choice you made.

Revision note. Written October 1, 2026, for the Default apps pages in current Windows 11 and Windows 10. If your files have been opening in the wrong app all week, the fix is a single page in Settings, and you did not break anything.