File browsing is enabled Windows 11 it’s never been the most pleasant experience, but it gets the job done as you’d expect. Things are working and your files are where you expect them to be. But for all the talk AI on WindowsFile management has not been particularly smart.
There is a tool that can change this and it is called Zoxid. It’s a file manager designed for the terminal, and I know it might sound scary, but it’s a welcome upgrade. And with the right set of tools, you can make it even better.
Zoxide remembers your folders
Stop typing all paths
The key to typically browsing your files is that you should always remember the full folder paths, whether you type them or not. Windows 11 highlights some of your most-used folders on the home page, but it only shows a few, which may not always be what you need. When it comes to the terminal, typing a full path every time is annoying, especially if you’re prone to typos like me. Sometimes I just use it cd command one folder at a time, so there is less chance of errors.
Zoxide fundamentally changes this by remembering every folder you’ve visited and ranking them by importance, which actually means that your most visited folders are ranked higher. When you visit the folder for the first time, you must type the full path as it is in the folder cd command, so it will look something like this:
z C:/Users/joaoc/Documents
However, after using it for the first time, Zoxide recalls Documents set the folder as the target, so the next time you want to return to it, you just have to type it
z Documents
Even if you’re in a completely different directory, Zoxide can take you to the correct directory, assuming your current directory doesn’t have one with the same name.
If you add multiple folders with the same name to your Zoxide index, Z command will take you to the top level option or you can use day command to see a list of results matching your search terms so you can manually select the ones you want. Alternatively, you can include part of the folder path while still following the entire path. For example, I have a folder called XDA in both Documents in my folder and mine Pictures folder, I can write something like this:
z Images/XDA
And whatever it is, it will take me to the right directory. If you notice that I’m using a backslash instead of the correct format that Windows uses, it doesn’t matter. Zoxide still knows the way and takes you to the right place, bypassing annoying Windows conventions. This is because Zoxide works more like a search engine, so you don’t really need any slashes, you can just type “XDA Images” and it will match the correct folder based on your search terms.
It can also be a proper file manager
fzf and yazi help
While Zoxide itself is great for changing folders or viewing file lists, it’s not ideal if you really want to open a file or view the folder structure. But pairing it with the right tools makes it even more useful so you can do some real file management.
First, there’s fzf, short for “fuzzy finder,” which does autocomplete for searches with Zoxide, and it also lets you edit your folder rankings so you can manually adjust what takes priority first. Just enter zoxide editingand then you can see the ranking of your indexed folders, as well as manually increase or decrease the rank for each one.
But the really cool stuff comes with a file manager script designed to run in the terminal. By using it in tandem with Zoxide and fzf, you can increase your productivity and access your files faster than ever. For starters, you can use Zoxide to navigate to a directory in the terminal, then log in to know to open a file manager in that folder so you can view and open the files there in a more structured and interactive way. Fzf is also useful here because you can press Z to start searching your current directory with fuzzy matching in yazi.
You can take this integration even further with some configuration changes. You can do this so that the folders you visit in yazi are also indexed in Zoxide, so you can use yazi to browse a folder more intuitively for the first time, and then keep the folders you’ve visited in order so you can quickly access them with Zoxide before you even open Yazi.
You need to go to the page to activate it %APPDATA%\write\config create a folder and file named beginning get. Edit the file with Notepad and add this content to it:
require("zoxide"):setup({
update_db = true,
})
After that, just restart your shell and you should be able to see the zoxide ranking change as you use script to browse the folders. This is a beneficial synergy.
After that, File Explorer feels sluggish
Zoxide is great
This combination of zoxide, fzf, and yazi creates a fantastic experience for managing and browsing files in the terminal, and it’s better than using it. File Explorer. All terminal tools are very responsive and lightweight, and they’re optimized for keyboard use, which makes them great if you don’t want to reach for the mouse every time.
That being said, it would be great if Zoxide could work better too with File Explorer. On macOS, you can actually integrate with Zoxide using a launcher like Raycast or Alfred and quickly find folders indexed by the tool, so you can jump right into that folder in your favorite file manager. Unfortunately, the Zoxide extension for Raycast is now available on Windows, so writing is still the best option. Other terminal-based file managers are also supported.
This is a game changer
Whether you’re someone who prefers to live in a terminal, a keyboard-oriented user, or just looking for a way to manage your files faster, Zoxide is a fantastic addition to your computer. You can easily install it via WinGet and other package managers where fzf and script are available. I highly recommend checking out the toolkit to see what you can do with it.
