3 Ways to Rename A Single File in Windows 10

Isabella Shinn

Updated: January 11, 2024

Although many things can be done in the simplest ways, it interests and even benefits us to discover and learn some new approaches. We all know how to rename a file or folder under Windows. All we need to do is to right-click on the file/folder and select Rename. Actually, there are some other methods to do that. This post shows you three ways to rename a file in Windows 10.

• Way 1: in File Explorer
• Way 2: with Command Prompt
• Way 3: with Windows PowerShell

Way 1: Rename a file in Windows 10 File Explorer

It is the most common and straightforward way to rename a file or folder in File Explorer. You can do that with any of the three means as shown below.

• Click the file you want to rename to select it, click it again to make its name editable, then type a new name and press the Enter key to confirm that. The interval between the two clicks should be more than one second, just in case that you double-click the file to open it instead of selecting it.
• Click the file you want to rename to select it and press the F2 key on your keyboard to make its name editable. Then type a new name and press Enter.
• Right-click on the file, select Rename from the context menu and then type a new name and press Enter.

Way 2: Rename a file using Command Prompt in Windows 10

You may not use this way often, but you can get to know how it works.

Step 1: Open the folder that contains the file you want to rename.

Step 2: Click the file to select it. Click the File tab, point to the Open Command Prompt option from the menu, and then click Open Command Prompt.

Step 3: After the Command Prompt window opens, type in ren "current_filename.ext" "new_filename.ext" and press the Enter key. The .ext is the file name extension.

Way 3: Rename a file with Windows PowerShell

Step 1: Open the folder that contains the file you want to rename.

Step 2: Select the file you want to rename, click the File tab, point to the Open Windows PowerShell option, and then click Open Windows PowerShell.

Step 3: After the Windows PowerShell window opens, type rename-item "current_filename.ext" "new_filename.ext", and press Enter.