Fixed – logged into Windows TEMP profile after restart

When you restart your windows system, you may notice that a temporary profile has been loaded/created instead of your existing/working profile, which looks like a fresh profile with new desktop wallpaper and desktop folders / files and seems your existing profile / personal settings gone!

Actually your existing profile is not lost, system just created another new profile (C:\Users\TEMP)

Sometimes you will notice an alert being pops up –

“You’ve been signed in with a temporary profile. You can’t access your files, and files created in this profile will be deleted when you sign out. To fix this, sign out and try signing in later. Please see the event log for more details or contact your system administrator.”

Why this happened

• OS might not able to identify your current profile
• If your current profile is delayed loading
• If profile accidentally deleted

How to fix

Method 1

Restart your PC 2-3 times, sometimes this might take you back to your current profile.



Method 2

Edit registry

Start > Run > regedit

On User access control dialog appears, click “Yes”

Navigate to below path

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\ProfileList

As shown above screenshot, 1st is your temp profile, rename

S-1-5-21-2012327785-2259879848-3711903672-144041.bak to S-1-5-21-2012327785-2259879848-3711903672-144041_Temp

2nd one is your existing profile, rename

S-1-5-21-2012327785-2259879848-3711903672-144041.bak to S-1-5-21-2012327785-2259879848-3711903672-144041

Do not change or update anything else in registry

One more thing to do – Delete the TEMP profile

Navigate to

Control Panel > System > Advanced system settings > User profile settings

Select the Temp profile and delete

Method 3

Check disk

Right click on C:\ drive or drive where OS is installed > Propeties > Tools

Check both the chcek boxes [options] and click on Ok to scan for errors, then restart to see if it works.

Method 4

If none of the above works,

• Reboot PC in safe mode
• Log on as administrator
• Rename existing user C:\Users\MyHome to C:\Users\MyHome_old

Note: MyHome is your profile which you want to restore

• Reboot and log on as MyHome user, this will create a new folder C:\Users\MyHome [fresh profile]
• Now transfer all your files from MyHome_old to MyHome folder