If you've found yourself with much less storage than you otherwise anticipated, to the tune of hundreds of missing gigabytes, there's a chance you've fallen victim to a new Windows 11 bug. That, or you're not very good at managing your storage (same).
As spotted by Windows Latest, this new bug involves the CapabilityAccessManager. This function in Windows 11 is responsible for app permissions like allowing apps to access your camera or microphone. It's a file that can reportedly grow in size, but it shouldn't take up to 500 GB, and it definitely shouldn't hold onto that storage indefinitely.
If you're wondering if you've been affected, you should be able to spot an anomaly if you go into storage settings and click on 'show more categories.' If 'System & reserved' is hundreds of GB large, or close to that, the bug has hit you.
Unfortunately, this method will only show you the problem if it's obvious and very large. Windows Latest does show another method for spotting the problem, using an elevated version of the command prompt. With Command Prompt on and run as administrator, type in the following command:
- robocopy "C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\CapabilityAccessManager" "%TEMP%\CAMCheck" /L /B /R:0 /W:0 /BYTES /NP
From here, you should be able to spot any anomalies in storage size. Some users have reported CapabilityAccessManager taking up to 500 GB in storage, with others reporting anywhere between 70 GB and 200 GB.
If you have been affected and want that storage back as soon as possible, you can opt to update to Windows 11 KB5095093 (builds 26200.8737 or 26100.8737), and this should fix the problem. You can get this update by clicking on Windows Update in Settings, going into advanced settings, and then clicking on optional updates. From here, you can check for optional updates and grab the latest patch.
If you don't want to willingly join optional builds of Windows 11, this update is expected to trickle down into a traditional Windows 11 update at some point in July. So, you can just hang on until then if it's not bothering you.
The next Windows 11 update comes with more than just that fix. For one, it introduces "a quieter, more focused Widgets experience", as it will no longer open on hover, and being more simplistic in use. It also introduces improved speed in File Explorer, new accessibility settings, and better Bluetooth stability among a greater range of devices. It's nice that this fix comes with some decent changes, but Microsoft's ability to accidentally implement the weirdest bugs is second to almost no one, other than maybe Dwarf Fortress.
