{"id":1189,"date":"2024-09-23T03:03:01","date_gmt":"2024-09-23T03:03:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/serverhost.com\/blog\/step-by-step-guide-to-disabling-the-recent-files-section-in-nautilus\/"},"modified":"2025-02-11T06:17:51","modified_gmt":"2025-02-11T06:17:51","slug":"step-by-step-guide-to-disabling-the-recent-files-section-in-nautilus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/serverhost.com\/blog\/step-by-step-guide-to-disabling-the-recent-files-section-in-nautilus\/","title":{"rendered":"Step-by-Step Guide to Disabling the &#8216;Recent&#8217; Files Section in Nautilus"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><p><strong>One of my most frequently used functions in the <em>Nautilus<\/em> file manager is the <em>Recent<\/em> files feature. It allows me to quickly access the files I&#8217;ve recently downloaded, modified, or created, all from one place, without worrying about their original directories.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><p>This feature is incredibly useful to me although I recognize that it can also be quite revealing.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><p>Not everyone is a fan of this feature because it lacks privacy in certain aspects. Although it&#8217;s possible to manually hide files from the Recent list, it requires extra effort. This means sensitive files or private materials could unintentionally become visible to others.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><p>There are also users who never utilize this feature and would rather have the option to eliminate this shortcut to free up space on their sidebar, which makes sense.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><p>Disabling the <em>Recent<\/em> files feature in <em>Nautilus<\/em> is straightforward, albeit there\u2019s no direct option within the <em>Nautilus<\/em> preferences panel, which is often the first place users check.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><p>To turn off the recent files in Ubuntu and other GNOME-based Linux distributions, you&#8217;ll need to navigate the privacy settings within the <em>Settings<\/em> app as follows:<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li><strong>Open the <em>Settings<\/em> app<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Select <em>Privacy &amp; Security<\/em> from the sidebar in the <em>Settings<\/em> app<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Access the <em>File History &amp; Trash<\/em> section<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Toggle the switch to disable &#8216;File History&#8217;<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><p>With <em>File History<\/em> disabled, the sidebar in Nautilus file manager no longer displays a &#8216;Recent&#8217; entry.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><p>Note: Disabling this feature doesn&#8217;t stop files from being indexed, searched, or accessed through other methods \u2013 there are separate controls for those functions.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><p>It is important to note that turning off recent files in the privacy settings will impact all applications that access and display a list of recent files, not only <em>Nautilus<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><p>Those who favor using the command line can achieve this with a single command:<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><pre>gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.privacy remember-recent-files false<\/pre>\n<\/p>\n<p><p>The command hides the \u201cRecent\u201d sidebar entry from <em>Nautilus<\/em> file manager (next time it is quit completely).<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><p>To later re-enable the \u201cRecent\u201d sidebar entry the command should be run again, this time without \u2018false\u2019 at the end, like so:<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><pre>gsettings reset org.gnome.desktop.privacy remember-recent-files<\/pre>\n<\/p>\n<p><p>And that\u2019s all there is to it.<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Worth noting: you can right-click on any file in the Recent \u2018folder\u2019 and select the \u2018Remove from recents\u2019 option to hide it from view.<\/li>\n<li>Leaked Spice Girls demos, obviously.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One of my most frequently used functions in the Nautilus file manager is the Recent files feature. It allows me to quickly access the files I&#8217;ve recently downloaded, modified, or created, all from one place, without worrying about their original directories. This feature is incredibly useful to me although I recognize that it can also [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1190,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[143,232,693],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-how-to","category-nautilus","category-ubuntu-basics"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>How to Disable Recent Files Section in Nautilus serverhost<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Learn how to disable the &quot;Recent Files&quot; section in Nautilus with this easy guide, offering more control over your privacy and file management in Ubuntu.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/serverhost.com\/blog\/step-by-step-guide-to-disabling-the-recent-files-section-in-nautilus\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How to Disable Recent Files Section in Nautilus serverhost\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Learn how to disable the &quot;Recent Files&quot; 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