Automate process of Disk Cleanup cleanmgr.exe without user intervention Automate process of Disk Cleanup cleanmgr.exe without user intervention powershell powershell

Automate process of Disk Cleanup cleanmgr.exe without user intervention


The following Powershell script automates CleanMgr.exe. In this case, it removes temporary files and runs the Update Cleanup extension to purge superseded Service Pack Backup files (Windows 10 now does this automatically via a scheduled task). To automate other extensions, create a "StateFlags0001" property in the corresponding Registry key, as done in the New-ItemProperty lines. You will find the Registry key names in the "VolumeCaches" branch.

As far as being silent, this script attempts to start CleanMgr.exe in a hidden window. However, at some point CleanMgr spawns new processes which are visible and must be waited on separately.

Write-Host 'Clearing CleanMgr.exe automation settings.'Get-ItemProperty -Path 'HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\VolumeCaches\*' -Name StateFlags0001 -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue | Remove-ItemProperty -Name StateFlags0001 -ErrorAction SilentlyContinueWrite-Host 'Enabling Update Cleanup. This is done automatically in Windows 10 via a scheduled task.'New-ItemProperty -Path 'HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\VolumeCaches\Update Cleanup' -Name StateFlags0001 -Value 2 -PropertyType DWordWrite-Host 'Enabling Temporary Files Cleanup.'New-ItemProperty -Path 'HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\VolumeCaches\Temporary Files' -Name StateFlags0001 -Value 2 -PropertyType DWordWrite-Host 'Starting CleanMgr.exe...'Start-Process -FilePath CleanMgr.exe -ArgumentList '/sagerun:1' -WindowStyle Hidden -WaitWrite-Host 'Waiting for CleanMgr and DismHost processes. Second wait neccesary as CleanMgr.exe spins off separate processes.'Get-Process -Name cleanmgr,dismhost -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue | Wait-Process$UpdateCleanupSuccessful = $falseif (Test-Path $env:SystemRoot\Logs\CBS\DeepClean.log) {    $UpdateCleanupSuccessful = Select-String -Path $env:SystemRoot\Logs\CBS\DeepClean.log -Pattern 'Total size of superseded packages:' -Quiet}if ($UpdateCleanupSuccessful) {    Write-Host 'Rebooting to complete CleanMgr.exe Update Cleanup....'    SHUTDOWN.EXE /r /f /t 0 /c 'Rebooting to complete CleanMgr.exe Update Cleanup....'}


You can use cleanmgr /verylowdisk to silently automate all the cleanup steps.


The only solution I found is to manually set the registry values like this:

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#Set StateFlags0012 setting for each item in Windows 8.1 disk cleanup utilityif (-not (get-itemproperty -path 'HKLM:\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\VolumeCaches\Active Setup Temp Folders' -name StateFlags0012 -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue)) {set-itemproperty -path 'HKLM:\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\VolumeCaches\Active Setup Temp Folders' -name StateFlags0012 -type DWORD -Value 2set-itemproperty -path 'HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\VolumeCaches\BranchCache' -name StateFlags0012 -type DWORD -Value 2set-itemproperty -path 'HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\VolumeCaches\Downloaded Program Files' -name StateFlags0012 -type DWORD -Value 2

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see full example