Sometimes we find it very annoying to use a folder because it is located deep inside many other folders. Every time we have to select this folder or use it in any other manner, we have to first open all those other folders first. An easy solution for this is to use the SUBST command.
Using the SUBST command we can create virtual drives which point to a folder of your own choice. This way we can create a virtual drive for a folder with a very very long path. When we access this virtual drive, that folder is accessed. Imagine having a virtual drive T: instead of C:\This\Path\Is\Very\Long\Indeed\.
In order to create a virtual drive on Windows 11, we can follow these steps:
- Right-click anywhere on the Windows Desktop and choose Open Windows Terminal. This will open Windows Terminal. You can also use Windows PowerShell or cmd.exe prompt as an alternative.
- If you want to create a virtual drive with letter K: that points to a folder C:\Temp, then you can give the following command: SUBST K: C:\TEMP where we have to keep a space between K: and the folder path.
- You can see this new drive in the Windows File Explorer as another drive. This drive will have the same capacity as the parent drive (in this case C: drive). You cannot format or partition this drive as it is virtual.
- In order to see all the virtual drives created using this method, we can use the command SUBST without any arguments. It will show a list of all the virtual drives and the paths they are assigned.
- If you want to remove a virtual drive, you can give the command SUBST /D K: where K: is the virtual drive that you want to remove. Of course, you have to replace K: with the drive letter for the virtual drive that you have created in your case.
One drawback of SUBST is that it is not permanent. The virtual drives are lost after a system reboot. But we can recreate the virtual drives again after the Windows starts.