Fix: No Video Thumbnails and No Preview Available for Video Files

When you open a folder containing video files, no thumbnails may be displayed for your videos. Also, when you click a video file in File Explorer, the Preview pane may neither show the image preview nor the mini-player control for the chosen file. In some cases, No preview available message is shown in the Preview pane for selected or all media file types.

fix for no preview available and no thumbnail

Resolution

Step 1: Enable Thumbnails and Preview Handlers

The first step is to make sure the folder settings are configured correctly.

  1. Click the File menu in File Explorer, and select Change folder and search options.
  2. In the Folder Options dialog, click the View tab.
  3. Uncheck Always show icons, never thumbnails
  4. Enable Show preview handlers in preview pane
    fix for no preview available and no thumbnail
  5. Click OK.

This enables the thumbnail previews and also activates the Preview handlers that are registered for each file type.

Step 2: Fix the Thumbnail and Preview handler registry entries

There are situations where the Folder Options settings do not make any difference. Some video file types may still show “No preview available” and without displaying a thumbnail. This happens if the preview and/or thumbnail handler shell extension registration is missing for that file type.

By default, the Windows Media Player’s Rich Preview Handler is registered for the following video file types out of the box.

3G2, 3GP, ASF, AVI, M2TS, MP4, MPE, MPEG, MPG, TTS, WMV

fix for no preview available and no thumbnail

The “No preview available” error usually occurs after associating the file type with a different multimedia player but the player didn’t add the preview handler registry entries. The ultimate fix is to add the thumbnail hander and the preview handler shell extensions for media files using the registry fix below.



After running the fix, image thumbnails, as well as the previews, should work fine for the supported file types, no matter which program you set as the default.

Important: Windows Media Player should be installed in order for the Windows Media Player Rich Preview Handler to work. You can install WMP via optional features and apply the registry settings below. Note that WMP need not be set as the default media player.

Registry Fix

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

; Video Thumbnail and Preview Handler Fix (for video file types)
; Created  on: July 04, 2016
; Reviewed on: July 26, 2022
;https://www.winhelponline.com/blog/

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.3gp\ShellEx\{8895b1c6-b41f-4c1c-a562-0d564250836f}]
@="{031EE060-67BC-460d-8847-E4A7C5E45A27}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.3gp\ShellEx\{BB2E617C-0920-11D1-9A0B-00C04FC2D6C1}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.3gp\ShellEx\{e357fccd-a995-4576-b01f-234630154e96}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"


[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.asf\ShellEx\{8895b1c6-b41f-4c1c-a562-0d564250836f}]
@="{031EE060-67BC-460d-8847-E4A7C5E45A27}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.asf\ShellEx\{BB2E617C-0920-11D1-9A0B-00C04FC2D6C1}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.asf\ShellEx\{e357fccd-a995-4576-b01f-234630154e96}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"


[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.avi\ShellEx\{8895b1c6-b41f-4c1c-a562-0d564250836f}]
@="{031EE060-67BC-460d-8847-E4A7C5E45A27}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.avi\ShellEx\{BB2E617C-0920-11D1-9A0B-00C04FC2D6C1}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.avi\ShellEx\{e357fccd-a995-4576-b01f-234630154e96}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"


[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mov\ShellEx\{8895b1c6-b41f-4c1c-a562-0d564250836f}]
@="{031EE060-67BC-460d-8847-E4A7C5E45A27}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mov\ShellEx\{BB2E617C-0920-11D1-9A0B-00C04FC2D6C1}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mov\ShellEx\{e357fccd-a995-4576-b01f-234630154e96}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"


[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mkv\ShellEx\{8895b1c6-b41f-4c1c-a562-0d564250836f}]
@="{031EE060-67BC-460d-8847-E4A7C5E45A27}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mkv\ShellEx\{BB2E617C-0920-11D1-9A0B-00C04FC2D6C1}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mkv\ShellEx\{e357fccd-a995-4576-b01f-234630154e96}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"


[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mp4\ShellEx\{8895b1c6-b41f-4c1c-a562-0d564250836f}]
@="{031EE060-67BC-460d-8847-E4A7C5E45A27}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mp4\ShellEx\{BB2E617C-0920-11D1-9A0B-00C04FC2D6C1}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mp4\ShellEx\{e357fccd-a995-4576-b01f-234630154e96}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"


[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mpe\ShellEx\{8895b1c6-b41f-4c1c-a562-0d564250836f}]
@="{031EE060-67BC-460d-8847-E4A7C5E45A27}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mpe\ShellEx\{BB2E617C-0920-11D1-9A0B-00C04FC2D6C1}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mpe\ShellEx\{e357fccd-a995-4576-b01f-234630154e96}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"


[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mpeg\ShellEx\{8895b1c6-b41f-4c1c-a562-0d564250836f}]
@="{031EE060-67BC-460d-8847-E4A7C5E45A27}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mpeg\ShellEx\{BB2E617C-0920-11D1-9A0B-00C04FC2D6C1}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mpeg\ShellEx\{e357fccd-a995-4576-b01f-234630154e96}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"


[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mpg\ShellEx\{8895b1c6-b41f-4c1c-a562-0d564250836f}]
@="{031EE060-67BC-460d-8847-E4A7C5E45A27}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mpg\ShellEx\{BB2E617C-0920-11D1-9A0B-00C04FC2D6C1}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.mpg\ShellEx\{e357fccd-a995-4576-b01f-234630154e96}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"


[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.wmv\ShellEx\{8895b1c6-b41f-4c1c-a562-0d564250836f}]
@="{031EE060-67BC-460d-8847-E4A7C5E45A27}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.wmv\ShellEx\{BB2E617C-0920-11D1-9A0B-00C04FC2D6C1}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.wmv\ShellEx\{e357fccd-a995-4576-b01f-234630154e96}]
@="{9DBD2C50-62AD-11D0-B806-00C04FD706EC}"

How to use:

Copy the above .reg file contents to Notepad, and save the file as fix-video-preview.reg. Double-click the file to apply the settings to the registry.

Is K-Lite Codec Pack installed?

If you have K-Lite Codec Pack installed on the computer, configuring it incorrectly would delete the above Windows thumbnail and preview handler registry keys. A good thing is that K-Lite software backs up the registry values in another location so that you can restore them later.

To restore the Windows default preview and thumbnail handler registry entries using K-Lite, follow these steps:

  1. Open the K-Lite Codec Tweak Tool.
  2. Click Thumbnails.
  3. On the Thumbnail Settings page, click Reset.
    reset video thumbnails and preview registry keys
  4. Click Yes to reset thumbnail settings to Windows default settings. Note that it will replace the Icaros Thumbnail provider module IcarosThumbnailProvider.dll (supplied by K-Lite Codec Pack) with Windows default thumbnail and preview handler shell extension(s).
    reset video thumbnails and preview registry keys

fix for no preview available and no thumbnail
This should restore back the video thumbnails as well as previews in Explorer.


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Ramesh Srinivasan is passionate about Microsoft technologies and he has been a consecutive ten-time recipient of the Microsoft Most Valuable Professional award in the Windows Shell/Desktop Experience category, from 2003 to 2012. He loves to troubleshoot and write about Windows. Ramesh founded Winhelponline.com in 2005.

3 thoughts on “Fix: No Video Thumbnails and No Preview Available for Video Files”

  1. Hello, just tried your solution but i didn’t work. Now I dont even get the “No preview available” in the preview pane. Any ideas?

    Reply

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