When adding a new user account in Windows 11, a profile for the account is automatically created when the user signs in to the new account for the first time.
A user profile is a collection of settings that make the computer look and work the way you want it to for a user account. It is stored in the user’s C:\Users\<user name> profile folder, and contains the account’s settings for desktop backgrounds, screen savers, pointer preferences, sound settings, and other features. User profiles ensure that your personal preferences are used whenever you sign in to Windows.
A user’s profile folder also contains their personal folders such as the Contacts, Desktop, Documents, Downloads, Favorites, Links, Music, OneDrive, Pictures, Saved Games, Searches, and Videos folders.
Since a user’s profile folder is automatically named by Windows by default, it will not always be named what you may have wanted its name to be. For example, when you add a Microsoft account to the PC, its user profile folder in the “C:\Users” folder will be named with the first 5 characters of the email address used for the Microsoft account.
This tutorial will show you how to rename a user profile folder for any account (local account or Microsoft account) in Windows 11.
1. Sign out of the user account (ex: “Brink2”) you want to change the name of its user profile folder (ex: “C:\Users\Brink2“).
2. Sign in to any administrator account on the PC that you are not changing its user profile folder name.
If you do not have another administrator account, then you can temporarily enable the built-in Administrator to sign in to do these steps.
3. Open Windows Terminal, and select either Windows PowerShell or Command Prompt.
4. Copy and paste the wmic useraccount get name,SID command into Windows Terminal, and press Enter. (see screenshot below)
Make note of the SID (ex: “S-1-5-21-2212846312-626644311-134141314-1002”) for the account (ex: “Brink2”) you want to change the name of its user profile folder. You will need to know this SID in step 6 below.
5. Open Registry Editor (regedit.exe).
6. Navigate to the key below in the left pane of Registry Editor. (see screenshot below)
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList\<SID>
Substitute <SID> in the registry key path above with the actual SID (ex: “S-1-5-21-2212846312-626644311-134141314-1002”) from step 4 above for the account name (ex: “Brink2”) you want to change the name of its user profile folder.
For example:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList\S-1-5-21-2212846312-626644311-134141314-1002
7. In the right pane of the SID key (ex: “S-1-5-21-2212846312-626644311-134141314-1002”), double click/tap on the ProfileImagePath expandable string value (REG_EXPAND_SZ) to modify it. (see screenshot above)
8. Change the current name of the user profile folder in its full path (ex: “C:\Users\Brink2“) to what you want (ex: “C:\Users\Brink3“) instead, and click/tap on OK. (see screenshot below)
Make note of the current full path and name (ex: “C:\Users\Brink2“) and new name (ex: “Brink3“) for this account’s user profile folder.
You will need to know both in step 10 and step 12 below.
9. You can close Registry Editor and Windows Terminal if you like. (see screenshot below)
10. Open File Explorer (Win+E), and navigate to the original full path of the user profile folder (ex: “C:\Users\Brink2“) from step 8 above.
11. Select the user profile folder (ex: “Brink2”), and click/tap on the Rename icon on the command bar at the top. (see screenshot below)
12. Change the current name of the user profile folder (ex: “Brink2”) to the same new name (ex: “Brink3”) from step 8 above. (see screenshot below)
13. You can now close File Explorer if you like.
14. If you use OneDrive, then change the OneDrive folder location to correct it for the new user profile folder name (ex: “Brink3”) if needed.
15. Reset and rebuild the Windows Search index to clear any entries pointing to the old profile folder name.
https://www.elevenforum.com/t/change-name-of-user-profile-folder-in-windows-11.2133/