OT OneTechly Plan accordingly • Build confidently Understanding .lnk Files: What They Are and Whether You Can Delete Them At some point while browsing your Windows file system, you'll probably notice files ending in .lnk — usually sitting on the desktop, in the Start Menu folder, or in recently accessed locations. They look like regular files, they open programs when you double-click them, and yet they're not the programs themselves. If you've ever wondered whether they're safe to delete, whether they're taking up meaningful storage, or what they actually are under the hood — this article answers all of that directly. What a .lnk File Actually Is A .lnk file is a Windows shortcut — a small file that contains a pointer to something else: a program, a document, a folder, a network location. When you double-click it, Windows reads where it's pointing and opens that target. The .lnk f...