Jump Lists - Back Up and Restore in Windows 8

How to Back Up and Restore Jump Lists in Windows 8 and 8.1​

   Information

Jump Lists contain a list of pinned items, recent items, and frequent places of your recently opened files, folders, websites, etc... when you right click or press and hold on a program's icon on the taskbar, or when you open File Explorer (Windows Explorer) and click/tap on the File tab.

This tutorial will show you how to back up and restore the recent items, frequent places, and pinned items in taskbar and File Explorer Jump Lists for your user account in Windows 8, Windows RT, Windows 8.1, and Windows RT 8.1.

   Note

By default, your Jump Lists and pinned items, recent items, and frequent places in them are saved in the folder locations below. You could copy the shell commands below into the Run (Windows + R) dialog and press Enter one at a time to open them. This is what this tutorial will be backing up and restoring for you automatically using a BAT file.

shell:Recent\AutomaticDestinations

Shell:Recent\CustomDestinations

EXAMPLE: Jump Lists - Pinned Items - Recent Items - Frequent Places in Windows 8

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OPTION ONE

To Back Up Pinned items, Recent items, and Frequent places in Windows 8 Jump Lists

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1. Click/tap on the Download button below to download the .bat file below, then run it.​

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Back-Up-Jump-Lists.bat​

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2. If prompted, click/tap on Run.​

NOTE: If you like, you can stop getting the Run prompt by unblocking the downloaded .bat file.​

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3. You will now notice your screen flicker as explorer is restarted.​

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4. You will now have a Jump-Lists-Backup folder on your desktop that is the backup of the current Pinned items, Recent items, and Frequent places in your Jump Lists.​

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5. Move this folder to where you like for safe keeping.​

NOTE: Do not rename this folder since it must remain the exact same name to be able to use it in OPTION TWO below to restore your Jump Lists.​

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OPTION TWO

To Restore Pinned items, Recent items, and Frequent places in Windows 8 Jump Lists

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1. If you have not already, make sure that any 3rd party programs that were pinned in your Jump Lists when the backup was created in OPTION ONE are still installed to the same location first.​

NOTE: Since pinned items in Jump Lists are just shortcuts that point to the program, the programs must still be at the same location when the backup was created before restoring the backed up Jump Lists.​

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2. Move or copy the Jump-Lists-Backup folder created from OPTION ONE above to your desktop.​

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3. Click/tap on the Download button below to download the .bat file below, then run it.​

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Restore-Jump-Lists.bat​

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4. If prompted, click/tap on Run.​

NOTE: If you like, you can stop getting the Run prompt by unblocking the downloaded .bat file.​

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5. You will now notice your screen flicker as explorer is restarted.​

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6. The backup of Pinned items, Recent items, and Frequent places have now been restored to your Jump Lists.​

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That's it,
Shawn

Related Tutorials

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• How to Turn "Recent Items" and "Frequent Places" On or Off in Windows 8 Jump Lists
• How to Reset and Clear Jump Lists in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Back Up and Restore Pinned Apps on Taskbar in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Back Up and Restore Taskbar Toolbars in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Create or Set Up Windows Backup to Back Up Files in Windows 8
• How to Back Up and Restore Quick Access Toolbar Settings in Windows 8 and 8.1

 

[vsrawat]

I wanted to transfer my jump lists from w8 to w10.

I booted into w8, ran back up bat file, and found a folder having jump lists on my desktop.

I booted into w10, copied that folder from w8 desktop to w10 desktop and run the restore bat file.

it ran, but nothing happened. My w10 jump list still is the same as was before going through this process. w8's jump didn't get added.

Thanks.

 

[vsrawat]

On a side not, nor really "nothing happened" (from previous reply).

Actually, you killed the explorer process and my screen went explorer-less. Somehow the macro didn't restart the explorer process.

glad I could remember task manager and went to that and ran explorer, so it all came back again, otherwise I would have to boot, loosing my current windows.

I found the same problem reported by another user in your other post about pin/unpin task bar bat file, where you have mentioned the same solution to restart explorer through task manager.

the back up macro didn't mess up with explorer, only the restore one did.

I saw the bat file, and find that you are killing explorer process, but the next command you are giving supposedly to start explorer process, is not really started explorer process, but is just opening an explorer window, which indeed opened. Hope you could figure out with this tip what has gone amiss.

Thanks.

 

[Brink]

Hello vsrawat,

The last line is for restarting the explorer process.

It sounds like something you have running had interfered with killing and restarting explorer.

 

[vsrawat]

It did kill, but didn't restart.

What can anyone be doing that interferes with starting explorer process? It works on all pcs all the time.

 

[Brink]

It could be a number of things from user or app that could interfere with restarting explorer.