How to Reset or Repair a Windows 10/11 App When it Fails to Work

Windows 10/1 includes a feature where you can quickly reset or repair a store app without having to uninstall and reinstall it. Universal Apps store their settings in per-app registry hives, and resetting the app is probably the only way you can clear the settings.

Reset or Repair a Windows 10/11 App

Windows 10

Open Settings (Win + i) and search for, and launch Apps & Features.

Select the app which you want to reset, click the Advanced options link, and click Reset.

Windows 11

On Windows 11, you’ll see a different screen. You need to click on the More icon (with three dots) and click “Advanced options”.

On the resulting page, click Repair and then Reset.

Note that some inbox apps can’t be uninstalled via this page.

This clears the settings used by the app, including stored credentials for that app (or service) if it uses one.

Reset apps using PowerShell

Starting with Insider Preview build 20175 and higher, Windows 10/11 now includes the new Reset-AppXPackage PowerShell cmdlet that can reset any UWP app. Here’s the syntax:

Reset a single app

1. Open PowerShell and run this command to view the list of app names:

   Get-AppxPackage | Select name

2. Copy the app name (e.g., Microsoft.Windows.Photos) from the list, that you want to reset.
3. Run the following command to reset that app:

   Get-AppxPackage Microsoft.Windows.Photos | Reset-AppxPackage

This resets the Photos app.

Note: If you run the above Reset-AppXPackage command in Windows 10 builds earlier than 20175, the following error would occur:

Reset-AppXPackage : The term 'Reset-AppXPackage' is not recognized as the name of a cmdlet, function, script file, or operable program. Check the spelling of the name, or if a path was included, verify that the path is correct and try again.

Reset multiple apps in one go

To reset multiple apps in one go, run this command:

 Get-AppxPackage | Out-GridView -Passthru | Reset-AppXPackage

Select the apps that you want to reset. Use the Ctrl key to multi-select items in the grid view, and click OK.