{"id":9357,"date":"2019-05-18T06:14:29","date_gmt":"2019-05-18T06:14:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/198.58.113.91\/blog\/?p=9357"},"modified":"2025-12-12T08:28:31","modified_gmt":"2025-12-12T02:58:31","slug":"find-and-delete-zero-byte-files-recursively-windows","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/find-and-delete-zero-byte-files-recursively-windows\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Delete Empty files (0 byte) in Windows?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Some applications create empty 0-byte files in their data folders and fail to clear them up. Over time, if you see many zero-byte files in a folder hierarchy, here are some methods to find all those 0-byte files and delete them.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

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Find and\/or delete empty (0 byte) files in Windows:<\/h4>\n
    \n
  1. using “Find Empty Files-n-Folders” utility<\/a><\/li>\n
  2. using Windows Search<\/a><\/li>\n
  3. using Command Prompt<\/a><\/li>\n
  4. using PowerShell<\/a><\/li>\n
  5. using VBScript<\/a><\/li>\n
  6. using DelEmpty.exe<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/div>\n

    Find and delete 0-byte files recursively in a folder tree<\/h2>\n

    It’s important to note that deleting 0-byte files arbitrarily can be problematic sometimes, as some applications may need them as a placeholder or for some other reason. If you’re sure that you don’t need any 0-byte files in a folder path and want to delete them all, follow one of the methods below.<\/p>\n

    Let’s start with a neat 3rd party freeware GUI tool, and then cover the native methods next.<\/p>\n

    <\/a>1. Using the “Find Empty Files-n-Folders” utility<\/h3>\n

    Find Empty Files-n-Folders is an excellent tool that can find and delete empty files (0-byte) and empty folders<\/a> recursively under a folder tree.<\/p>\n

    Download Find Empty Files-n-Folders<\/a> (600KB installer) from Ashisoft.com.<\/p>\n

    Select the folder and click Scan Now.<\/p>\n

    \"remove<\/p>\n

    The tool will list empty files and folders in separate tabs.<\/p>\n

    From the Empty Files tab, click Mark all Files<\/strong> and then click Delete Files<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

    \"remove<\/p>\n

    Similarly, to delete the 0-byte files<\/a> in the selected folder tree, click on the Empty Files<\/strong> tab.<\/p>\n

    Ashisoft.com has other awesome tools that you can check out!<\/p>\n

    \n

    <\/a>2. Using Windows Search<\/h3>\n

    Windows Search allows you to list all 0-byte files using the size:<\/code> query operator.<\/p>\n

    Open the folder where you want to find or delete empty files.<\/p>\n

    In the search box, type size:empty<\/code> or size:0 KB<\/code><\/p>\n

    \"find<\/p>\n

    To filter the results by a file extension (e.g., javascript files \u2192 extension .js<\/code> ), use the following Advance Query Syntax<\/a> (AQS):<\/p>\n

    size:empty AND ext:js<\/pre>\n
    \"find<\/p>\n
    \n
    <\/a>3. Using Command Prompt<\/h3>\n
    To list all 0-byte (0 KB) files is a folder and sub-folders recursively and output the names to a file, use the following command.<\/p>\n
    Note that you’ll need to run the command from the folder where you want to find or delete empty (0 KB) files.<\/p>\n
    for \/r %F in (*) do @if %~zF==0 echo \"%F\" >>d:\\0byte-files.txt<\/pre>\n
    Alternately, you can include the target folder path in the for<\/code> command so that you don’t have to change the directory in the console window. Example:<\/p>\n
    for \/r \"d:\\websites\" %F in (*) do @if %~zF==0 echo \"%F\" >>d:\\0byte-files.txt<\/pre>\n
    That way, you don’t have to switch over to that particular folder in Command Prompt<\/p>\n
    The complete list of 0-byte files output is written to the file named 0byte-files.txt<\/code> on the D:\\<\/code> drive.<\/p>\n
    \"find<\/p>\n
    To delete the files, you’d use the del<\/code> command instead of echo<\/code>.<\/p>\n
    for \/r %F in (*.*) do @if %~zF==0 del \"%F\"<\/pre>\n
    or mention the target folder path in the command itself:<\/p>\n
    for \/r \"d:\\websites\" %F in (*.*) do @if %~zF==0 del \"%F\"<\/pre>\n
    Find and delete 0-byte files having a specific file extension<\/h4>\n
    In the above examples, you can even filter by file extension. For instance, to delete 0-byte .txt<\/code> files, you’d use *.txt<\/code> instead of *.*<\/code> or *<\/code><\/p>\n
    for \/r %F in (*.txt) do @if %~zF==0 del \"%F\"<\/pre>\n
    or with mentioning the folder path:<\/p>\n
    for \/r \"d:\\websites\" %F in (*.txt) do @if %~zF==0 del \"%F\"<\/pre>\n
    That would delete all the empty .txt<\/code> files from the current folder and sub-folders, or in the specified folder tree recursively.<\/p>\n
    Create a Batch file<\/h4>\n
    If you’d like to make a batch file to find and list<\/strong> empty files and output the results to a text file, here is one:<\/p>\n
    @echo off\r\nset out=\"d:\\0byte-files.txt\"\r\nfor \/r \"%~1.\" %%A in (*.*) do if %%~zA == 0 echo \"%%~fA\" >> %out%<\/pre>\n
    Save the above contents as find-empty-files.bat<\/code>.<\/p>\n
    To delete<\/strong> empty files rather than outputting the list of files, use this batch file:<\/p>\n
    @echo off\r\nfor \/r \"%~1.\" %%A in (*.*) do if %%~zA == 0 del \"%%~fA\"<\/pre>\n
    To run the batch file<\/strong> against a folder recursively, you’d use the following syntax:<\/p>\n
    d:\\scripts\\find-empty-files.bat  d:\\websites<\/pre>\n
    \n
    What does the above command do?<\/h4>\n