How to Reset Notepad and WordPad to Default

If you’ve changed the default font settings and other options in WordPad or Notepad and want to revert back to Windows default values, this post tells you how to do that.

Reset Notepad settings

If you’ve altered the default Notepad font or encoding (using the iDefaultEncoding registry value), the margin, and header settings incorrectly, you can quickly reset them to the default values.

The settings for Notepad are stored in this registry key:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Notepad

Right-click on the key and choose Delete.

Exit the Registry Editor.

Note: The Notepad Store app (UWP) is bundled by default on Windows 11. In that case, you need to access “Settings” → “Apps” → “Apps & Features” in order to reset the new/modern Notepad settings.

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Reset WordPad Settings

To reset WordPad settings, follow these steps:

Start Regedit.exe and go to:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Applets\Wordpad

The Options subkey stores the Wordpad settings you configured. Delete this key would restore the original settings when you open Wordpad next time.

The Recent File List subkey stores the list of most recently used files in Wordpad, which is shown when you click the File menu in Wordpad.

To clear the most recently used files listing, delete this key.

Using Command-line or Batch file

To do this quickly using the command-line, run this from Command Prompt.

reg delete HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Notepad /f

reg delete HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Applets\Wordpad /f

You should see the message The operation completed successfully.