Start Emacs at Home Dir on Microsoft Windows

By Xah Lee. Date: .

How to start emacs with default dir at home dir?

(If you are starting emacs from command line, simply cd to home dir first.)

Create a Windows shortcut, then set the “Start in” field.

Windows 10 emacs shortcut 2023-10-01 bcGc
Windows 10 emacs shortcut 2023-10-01 bcGc

To create a file shortcut:

  1. Hold Alt then drag that runemacs.exe icon to desktop.
  2. In the newly created alias icon, right click to open file properties. Then, in the “Start in” field, enter %HOMEPATH%.
  3. In the “Target” field, you can add Emacs: Command Line Options after the .exe.

Emacs on Microsoft Windows