How to permanently disable VLC recent played list on dock /taskbar

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Many people use VLC Media Player and I think everyone likes privacy also. But in Windows 7 or Windows 8, VLC somehow violate your privacy. You play some videos and delete from recent played list from VLC Preferences but it is not enough. If you right click on VLC icon on the dock, you can see all recent played items. So privacy sucks. Here is the solution. If you are using Windows 8 or 10, jump to my new article to disable VLC history on Windows 10.

Read also How to Make Wi Fi HotSpot on Laptop to share internet with mobile
Read also 15 VLC Media Player Shortcuts You Should Know About. VLC Player is one of the best player right now and it could play almost all kind of files. But one loves privacy.VLC History - Topbullets.com
First change the VLC setting so that it could not remember Recent Played List.
Open VLC player. Go to Tools << Preferences and Under Interface, there is an option “Save recent played list”. uncheck that option. Follow the below image.
VLC History
Now after disable the option, we have to disable the default options of Windows also. Actually is a feature of Windows. Whatever you do in your system, Windows make a temp folder and save all items. You can navigate to the folder.
Click on start or My Computer and paste
“%AppData%\Microsoft\Windows\Recent Items” or go to “C:\Users\(User Name)\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Recent Items”.
To delete all recent activities, open cmd and paste this code.
del %appdata%\microsoft\windows\recent\automaticdestinations\*
Read also How to Make Wi Fi HotSpot on Laptop to share internet with mobile
To disable this feature permanently right click on your “Toolbar” and go to Properties<< Start Menu option and uncheck the option “Store and display recent opened in the Start menu and the taskbar.” Read also 15 VLC Media Player Shortcuts You Should Know About
You can uncheck both options. Choose wisely what you want. Image
VLC hostory

Now open your VLC player and right click on the taskbar icon, you won’t see recent items anymore. Be advised: This would disable to remember all application’s history not only for VLC. 🙂
VLC history

If you are working on Windows 10, then follow these steps:
Windows10 – Right Click on the desktop, => Personalize=> Start=> Show recently used files jumplist => off.
courtesy – Thomas (Below)

The article can also useful for
1. How to disable VLC not to store Recent Played Items
2. How to delete VLC history permanently.
3. How to remove list on the right click of VLC icon at taskbar/dock.
4. How to disable system to not to store Recent Activity.
5. How to delete recent activity in Windows 7, Windows 8
6. How to disable VLC history on Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 8

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82 thoughts on “How to permanently disable VLC recent played list on dock /taskbar”

  2. I am using Windows 8.1. This does not help completely. When I still search suppose the word ‘the’ in the start screen, I still get all video results I may have played…even if they are a month old. Please help in solving this particular problem.

    Reply

      • Yes I have unchecked everything. It does everything said above. But this problem persists. Also, I found the result is not shown if I change the location of the file. Example, if I have a video “Perks.flv” in Download folder and I play it having everything unchecked as said above, and then I search “perks” in Search, I will get a “Perks.flv” result as long as I have played it atleast once. As soon as I change the file location, it will be removed from the search result. However, when I play it again from the new location, there it is back again.

        Reply

  17. PTL… found it finally, outside VLC. Had the same prob…. found the residual files showing in VLC in Windows history (hidden).
    Expand Explorer to View hidden files; go to appdata, local, windows, history. Clear the history of each “This PC” folder located in each of the files labeled 3 Weeks, 2 Weeks, Last Week, Today. (Or, you cold probably just open IE and open history from there and delete these.) Either way, worked like a champ for me. Win 8.1.

    Reply

  23. Wanted to express my appreciation for this excellent webpage! Of 5 different sites I searched, yours is the only one that works for WIn 8.1 (but had to go to the “Jump Lists” tab on Task Bar Properties dialogue box). Now back to my porn… 😉

    Reply

  27. For windows 10

    go to setting (click on start icon) then go to personalization.
    It shows background ,colors,lock screen,themes, start.
    Click on start
    then click off -show recently opened items in jump lists on taskbar or start.

    Reply

  34. Hi,
    I Don’t want to stop the recent Media additions completely, I just want to stop adding each played song being added. With VLC ver 2.1.3., I used to be able to add several folders with different music types and be able to choose which one I wanted to play each session using [Cont, 1, 2, 3, etc.]. But now, played songs are added causing my folders to scroll off the window. I recently upgraded from Win 8.1 to win 10, and a few days later, VLC from v 2.1.3 to 2.2.1. I don’t know which change caused the problem. Maybe neither, maybe it’s just a setting I am unable to find. Can anyone help? Thanks!
    David

    Reply

    • Hi again, (David Inman Here)
      In reference to the scrolling list question above:
      I just discovered that I can put my folders into “My Music” and they are saved in the same way, and are available to start and run the playlist. This is probably what I should have been doing the last year or so. Just a little more investigation and I wouldn’t have asked the question. Thanks anyway.

      Reply

  48. i have the opposite problem. after an update windows and VLC stopped showing the history list. i want to turn in back on but several searches have been fruitless. everything is correctly checked, both in windows taskbar menu and VLC preferences.
    if i go to VLC – media – open recent media then that list is shown. but not the right click on the taskbar, nor the vlc icon in the start menu. they show nothing.

    thanks

    Reply

    • Hey JPS, this is the most unexpected comment for this article 🙂 🙂 . But I welcome you doubt. As of now I don’t have any solution but will surely post the solution if I get. Thanks for coming to my blog.
      Regards,
      DKS

      Reply

  50. Hey Thomas, I just followed your privacy tip for VLC player for windows 7, and it works great. For people who read too fast and are still having trouble, you should unhide your files in -> Control Panel -> Folder Options -> View -> in the list under hidden files and folders, push button saying “Show Hidden files, folders and drives”. Now you can find C:\Users. Also if the cmd prompt is giving you trouble, type : cd\ , and then cd users (press enter), then cd appdata etc until you are at the folder “windows”, and then type “del %appdata% recent\automaticdestinations\*” without quotes. The trouble is caused by not properly quoting the spaces in the username, so windows will be unable to find the path. Navigating manually with cd (folder name) will simplify that. Thanks alot Thomas, now my private habits are hidden :D/.

    Reply

  52. 5th or 6th time Im here over the years. Thought about bookmarking but Ive prob done that too every time Ive been here. Anyways… Thanks… again

    Reply

  55. you watching star trek goood hhhhh ☺
    but me I watch Star Trek- Enterprise – Season 1 and 2 and 3 … ☺

    Reply

  56. you watching star trek goood hhhhh ☺
    but me I watch Star Trek- Enterprise – Season 1 and 2 and 3 … ☺

    Reply

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