Snipping Tool history: where your screenshots actually go
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Windows Snipping Tool keeps no history. There is no list of past snips inside it, so your screenshot is in one of two places: saved as a file in your Pictures folder, or sitting in Windows’ clipboard history until the next restart.
Which one depends on whether you saved it or only copied it. Below is where to look, what that TempState folder everyone recommends actually contains, and what to do when a snip is genuinely gone. Checked against Microsoft’s own documentation and a Windows 11 machine on 20 August 2026.
The two places a snip can be
A snip taken with Snipping Tool, or with Windows logo key + Shift + S, ends up in one of these two places and nowhere else.
| Where it ends up | When | How long it lasts |
|---|---|---|
| Pictures\Screenshots | Automatically, if auto-save is on, and it is on by default | Permanently, until you delete it yourself |
| Clipboard history (Win+V) | Every snip, because taking one puts it on your clipboard | 25 items, and cleared every time you restart |
| Nowhere else | Never | There is no hidden cache and no list of past snips in the app |
Auto-save and the Screenshots folder come from Microsoft’s own Snipping Tool page; the 25 items and the restart wipe from its clipboard page. Both checked 20 August 2026.
Why there’s no Snipping Tool history
Microsoft’s own documentation for Snipping Tool describes capturing, annotating and saving. It never mentions a history, because there isn’t one.
Their support page covers the whole app: take a snip, mark it up, save it, share it. No history feature is described anywhere on it, because none exists. What it does say is that “After you capture a snip, it is automatically saved to your Screenshots folder”, and that folder is as close to a history as Snipping Tool gets.
It isn’t neglect, either. Recent versions added a quick markup toolbar, text extraction, screen recording and GIF export, so the app is very much still being worked on. A list of your past snips just isn’t one of the things Microsoft built.
The TempState folder is real, and your snips aren’t in it
Search for this and you will be told, more than once, to paste %LOCALAPPDATA%
The folder does exist. On the Windows 11 machine we checked, on 20 August 2026, there was not a single screenshot in it.
We went and looked. On that machine the folder was there, and the only thing inside it was a Recordings subfolder with nothing in it at all. Recordings belongs to Snipping Tool’s screen recorder, which writes video there while you record. No screenshots, and nothing resembling a cache of old snips.
It had also been sitting there since the day Snipping Tool was installed, so it is not something that appears when you lose a screenshot. That is what makes the advice so frustrating. You follow it, you find the folder exactly where you were promised it would be, and there is nothing useful inside, while the snip you actually want is most likely in Pictures\Screenshots all along.
The snip you can’t find is the one you only copied
Here is the case that genuinely loses screenshots. You took a snip, pasted it straight into whatever you were working in, and never saved it. From that moment the only copy is the one on your clipboard, and Windows’ clipboard history holds 25 items and empties itself every time you restart.
So if you have restarted since, that one is gone, and there is nowhere to recover it from.
If you haven’t restarted, press Win+V and go and rescue it now.
We’ve written up the Windows clipboard history limits in full, including the size cap on a single item and the three settings Windows actually gives you.
What actually fixes it
Fair warning before this section: we make a paid Windows app that keeps what you copy, so read it with that in mind. The first two fixes are free, and they will settle this for most people.
- Check auto-save is on. Open Snipping Tool, click the three dots, choose Settings, and look for Automatically save original screenshots. It’s on by default, but people turn it off and so do work machines. With it on, every snip becomes a file whether you remember to save it or not.
- Make the Screenshots folder somewhere you’d actually look. Pictures, then Screenshots, fills up with timestamped files and nothing ever tidies it. Pin it to Quick access, sort by date, and “where did my screenshot go” stops being a question. You can also point Snipping Tool at a different folder from that same Settings pane.
- Or keep your screenshots somewhere that isn’t the clipboard. If the ones you lose are the ones you took, pasted and never saved, you want something that holds images for longer than 25 items and a restart. Copychest is ours: it grabs a region of your screen, you mark it up, and the marks stay editable after you’ve saved, so a badly placed arrow is still fixable next week. Paid, with a free tier, and that’s the bias we flagged above.
Does Snipping Tool keep a history?
No. There is no list of past snips in the app and no setting that turns one on. What you have instead is the Screenshots folder, where auto-save puts a copy of every snip, and Windows’ clipboard history, which holds the last 25 things you copied until you restart.
Where does Snipping Tool save screenshots by default?
In your own Pictures folder, in a subfolder called Screenshots. Files are named with the date and time they were taken, so sorting by name and sorting by date give you the same order. You can move that folder somewhere else from Snipping Tool’s own Settings.
Can I get back a snip I never saved?
Only if you haven’t restarted since. Press Win+V, scroll the list, and if it’s still there paste it into Paint or a document and save it properly this time. If you have restarted, it’s gone: Windows clears clipboard history on every restart apart from anything pinned, and there is no cache of old snips to dig it out of.
Why did my screenshot vanish from Win+V?
Most likely one of two things.
- You restarted your PC, which empties clipboard history apart from pinned items.
- Or you’ve copied 25 things since, and it dropped off the bottom of the list to make room.
Both are Windows working exactly as designed, and neither is something you can repair.
Does changing the save location move the old ones?
No. Changing it in Snipping Tool’s Settings only affects new snips, and everything already in Pictures\Screenshots stays exactly where it is. So if you moved the setting and an old screenshot has gone missing, check the old folder before you assume the worst.
Sources
- How to take and annotate screenshots on Windows, Microsoft Support. Auto-save to the Screenshots folder, how to change the save behaviour and the folder, and no mention of a history feature anywhere on the page. Checked 20 August 2026.
- Using the clipboard, Microsoft Support. The 25-item cap and the restart wipe. Checked 20 August 2026.
- Our own check of %LOCALAPPDATA%\Packages\Microsoft.ScreenSketch_8wekyb3d8bbwe\TempState on a Windows 11 machine, 20 August 2026. Present, created when Snipping Tool was installed, and holding only an empty Recordings subfolder. No screenshots.