Windows clipboard history limits: 25 items, 4 MB, and gone at restart
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Windows clipboard history, the list you get with Win+V, keeps your last 25 copied items, holds up to 4 MB per item, and clears itself every time you restart your PC, apart from anything you have pinned. Microsoft publishes no setting that raises any of those limits.
This page is the whole picture: what the limits actually are, why your list emptied itself, and what your options are if 25 is not enough. Every number here was checked against Microsoft’s own documentation on 1 August 2026.
The limits, in full
Every limit Windows puts on clipboard history is in the table below, with the Microsoft page that documents each one.
| What | The limit | Source |
|---|---|---|
| How many items Windows keeps | 25 | Microsoft Support |
| Largest single item | 4 MB | Microsoft Support |
| What it can hold | Text, HTML and bitmap images | Microsoft Support |
| When it fills up | The oldest unpinned item drops off | Microsoft Support |
| When you restart your PC | The whole list is cleared, except pinned items | Microsoft Support |
| Can you raise the 25? | No. Windows has no setting for it | Microsoft Learn |
Why does my clipboard history only show 25 items?
Because 25 is the cap. Microsoft’s support page states that “your clipboard history is limited to 25 copied entries”. Copy a 26th thing and the oldest unpinned item drops off the bottom to make room. Nothing is broken and there is nothing to repair. This is Windows working exactly as designed.
Can I increase the Windows clipboard history limit past 25?
No. There is no setting in Windows that makes clipboard history hold more than 25 items, and Microsoft documents none. The Clipboard page in Settings offers three things and only three: turn history on or off, sync it to your other computers, and clear it. Even the group policy that IT departments use is a straight on-or-off switch, with no size or count to set.
If you come across a post or a video promising a registry tweak that raises the cap, be careful. We went looking for a documented setting behind those claims and there isn’t one, and editing the registry on a work computer to chase a maybe is a bad trade. The honest answer is the dull one: if you need more than 25, you need a different clipboard app, and some good ones are free.
Why did my clipboard history disappear after I restarted?
Because Windows clears it on every restart. Microsoft’s troubleshooting page says so directly: clipboard history is cleared each time you restart your PC, except for the items you have pinned. A shutdown does it, a restart does it, and so does a Windows update that reboots your machine overnight.
Pinning is the only thing that survives. Open Win+V, click the three dots on an item and choose Pin. Pinned items also survive Clear all.
Win+V isn’t saving what I copy. What’s going on?
There are five likely reasons, and only the first one is a mistake.
- Clipboard history is off. It stays off until you turn it on. Press Win+V and choose Turn on.
- The item is bigger than 4 MB. Windows will not keep it in your history.
- The format isn’t supported. Clipboard history holds text, HTML and bitmap images. Copy a file, a folder or something unusual out of a design app and it will paste normally but never appear in the list.
- It was a password. Most password managers mark what you copy as secret so that clipboard tools skip it. We know this one from building a clipboard app, and it is a good thing, not a bug.
- Your work computer has it switched off. If Win+V does nothing at all on a company machine, IT may have disabled clipboard history with a policy. That policy turns off the Windows feature; it does not stop other clipboard apps working, though your IT team may well have views about installing one.
Does the 4 MB cap mean I can’t copy anything bigger?
No, and this is the bit that trips people up. The 4 MB cap is on what clipboard history stores, not on copying and pasting. Microsoft’s own developer blog says there is no preset maximum size for clipboard data and that you are limited only by available memory. So copying an enormous spreadsheet still pastes into the next app perfectly well. It just will not be sitting in your Win+V list afterwards.
Do pinned items count towards the 25?
Microsoft doesn’t document this, so we are not going to state it as fact. If you rely on pinned items, keep the number modest and you will not have to find out the hard way.
Can I get my clipboard history on my other computers?
Yes. In Settings, go to System, then Clipboard, and turn on “Clipboard history across your devices”. It is tied to your Microsoft or work account, so you need to be signed in with the same one everywhere. You can have Windows sync everything you copy automatically, or leave it manual and press the sync button on the individual items you want sent across.
Syncing does not raise the 25-item cap. It shares the same short list between more machines.
The three settings Windows does give you
- Turn it on. Press Win+V, then choose Turn on.
- Clear it. Settings, System, Clipboard, then Clear. Or press Win+V and choose Clear all. Neither touches your pinned items.
- Delete one item. Press Win+V, click the three dots next to the item, and choose Delete.
So what do you actually do about it?
Fair warning before this section: we make a paid clipboard app, so read it with that in mind. None of the links below are affiliate links and we get nothing if you download any of them.
Sometimes the answer is nothing
For a lot of people, Win+V is genuinely fine. If you copy a link, paste it, and move on, 25 items is more than you will ever need, and the restart wipe is a feature rather than a problem. The limits only start to hurt when your job involves copying the same things over and over, day after day. If that isn’t you, close this tab with our blessing.
The free ones worth knowing about
If your only problem is that 25 is not enough, these will fix it for nothing.
Ditto keeps thousands of items, they survive a restart, and it has been around for years. It is free and open source, it was still being worked on this summer, and it does the job well. Fair warning on the looks: Ditto’s interface is properly dated, somewhere around Windows XP, and no amount of goodwill fixes that. If you genuinely only care that it works, it works. If you have to look at it forty times a day, you will notice.
CopyQ is the powerful one. Free, open source, actively updated, and it will do almost anything you can think of with your clipboard. It is also the most technical of the three, and it can feel like a lot of settings for a job you thought was simple.
ClipClip is free for personal use and looks more modern than the other two. Worth knowing before you install it at the office: using it for work is commercial use, and they ask $49 per person, once, for that.
And then there’s us
Copychest is our Windows app, and it is a paid one. We built it for people whose day is answering the same emails: it keeps the replies you send every week, fills in the name and the date for you, and keeps a clipboard history that is still there tomorrow morning. Everything stays on your own computer, with no account and no cloud. There is a free tier that never expires, and Pro is $17 once rather than a subscription.
If all you needed was more than 25 items, take Ditto. We would rather you had a working clipboard than a poor opinion of us.
Sources
- Using the clipboard, Microsoft Support. The 25-item cap, the 4 MB per-item limit, supported formats, the restart wipe and the sync settings. Checked 1 August 2026.
- Policy CSP, Experience, Microsoft Learn. AllowClipboardHistory, the group policy that turns clipboard history on or off, and the only administrative control Microsoft documents for it. Checked 1 August 2026.
- Is there a maximum size for Windows clipboard data?, The Old New Thing, Microsoft, June 2022. No preset maximum size for clipboard data itself. Checked 1 August 2026.