How to Set a Custom User Folder Name During Windows 11 Installation

Historically, installing Windows 11 forces users to sign in with a Microsoft account during the OOBE (Out‑of‑Box Experience) phase, and the system automatically creates a user folder whose name is the first five characters of the account’s email address. Many users dislike this truncated name for privacy or readability reasons.

In the latest Windows 11 Dev Build 26300.8068, Microsoft introduced a new setting on the device‑name page of OOBE that allows a custom user folder name. Users can now type any valid NTFS‑compatible name (no slashes, backslashes, quotes, pipes, question marks, asterisks, or angle brackets) and the system will create the profile folder with that exact name.

If you create a local account first (e.g., named "蓝点网"), the folder will retain that name even after later signing in with a Microsoft account, and all services continue to work. This avoids the default "dashu" folder that would result from an account like [email protected].

Important limitations: the custom name can only be set during the initial OOBE of a new installation or a full system reset. Existing installations cannot change the folder name via this UI, and manual renaming carries a risk of breaking applications that rely on paths under AppData. Therefore, Microsoft does not recommend directly renaming the folder on an already‑installed system.

The new feature will be merged into the Windows 11 25H2 release after testing, but until then it is limited to the Dev Build and only applies to fresh installations.