Move Telegram for Windows Data Folder from C: Drive to Another Drive

Telegram Desktop stores chats, media cache, and account data in your user folder on the system drive, usually C:. Over time, that drive can fill up. Here is how to move the whole data folder to another drive so Telegram keeps working normally.

Check the current data folder location first

Open Telegram for Windows, go to 「Settings」→「Advanced」→「Data and Storage」, and find the 「Data folder」 or 「Local storage」 entry. Click it to see the full path of the current data folder, usually something like C:\Users\your-username\AppData\Roaming\Telegram Desktop.

You can also press Win+R, type %appdata%, press Enter to open the Roaming folder, and find the folder named Telegram Desktop. That is the default data directory. Write down this path, since you will need it later.

Note: do not copy only part of the files. Chats, media, and account information are linked, so you must move everything together.

Quit Telegram completely before moving the folder

Before moving anything, close Telegram completely. Otherwise the files are in use and the copy may be incomplete. The correct way is: right-click the tray icon and choose 「Quit」, then open Task Manager and make sure no Telegram-related processes are running.

Next, cut or copy the entire Telegram Desktop folder to the target drive, for example D:\Telegram Desktop. It is better to copy first rather than cut directly. Once you confirm the new location works, delete the old folder to avoid losing data if something goes wrong.

If the target drive is an external hard drive or USB stick, it is not recommended as a long-term data directory. If the device is unplugged, Telegram will not be able to read the data.

Point Telegram to the new data folder with a launch parameter

Telegram for Windows supports specifying the data directory with a launch parameter. Find the Telegram shortcut, right-click it, choose 「Properties」, add a space at the end of the 「Target」 field, and then add: -workdir 「D:\Telegram Desktop」.

Note that the parameter name is -workdir, the path must be wrapped in double quotes, and the path should not contain Chinese characters or special symbols, or it may not be recognized. Click OK to save your changes.

From then on, you must always launch Telegram through this shortcut. Double-clicking the exe file directly will still use the default directory. If you want this to apply at startup too, you need to update the corresponding shortcut in your startup items as well.

Verify the result and common issues

Double-click the modified shortcut to launch Telegram, go to 「Settings」→「Advanced」→「Data and Storage」, and confirm that the data folder path now points to the new location and that chats and media open normally. That means the move succeeded.

Common issues: if Telegram says it cannot find the data or asks you to log in again after launch, the path is probably wrong, quotes are missing, or the old folder was not copied completely. In that case, quit the program, check the path spelling, and confirm the new directory really contains the full Telegram Desktop contents.

Once everything works, delete the original Telegram Desktop folder on C: to free up space. If you later want to go back to the default location, just remove the -workdir parameter from the shortcut.

Also, official Telegram clients are available only from telegram.org, Google Play, and the App Store. The installer entry on this site is not an official Telegram download, and this migration method works the same way for the official desktop version.