How to Increase Clipboard Size on Windows 10 & 11

Add onto your Clipboard and keep your items for longer

Reading time icon 3 min. read


Readers help support Windows Report. When you make a purchase using links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Tooltip Icon

Read the affiliate disclosure page to find out how can you help Windows Report effortlessly and without spending any money. Read more

Key notes

  • A basic task that is necessary on a regular basis for Windows computers is copying and pasting data using the Clipboard.
  • Most people want to increase the number that can be saved to improve their efficiency and experience working with Windows.

If you love copying and pasting text and images between your devices, you’re probably familiar with the Windows Clipboard. While you’re able to copy and paste from this tool, there is a limit to how much you can place in the Clipboard history. 

Most users don’t want to clear the Clipboard history to create space for new items as they could still need that information. For today, let’s look at how we can increase the size to accommodate more.

How long is Windows Clipboard history?

The answer depends on how you’re using your system. If you’re not familiar with the Windows Clipboard, it’s a temporary storage area for text and images that you copy or cut from a document or program. 

This brings us to the question: Does Windows Clipboard have a limit? Not really. The Windows Clipboard has a limit, but it’s not a hard limit. The number of items that you can store on the Clipboard depends on your system’s memory and the number of items you’ve copied.

When you reach this limit, older items will be deleted or you will get an error. The error will notify you that your Windows Clipboard is out of memory. Occasionally, you will see a message saying 24 of 24 items collected indicating the Clipboard is full.

If there are important items, you will have to pin them. Better yet, it is always good practice to run Disk Cleanup so that you are not constantly running out of space. 

How can I increase the size of the Windows Clipboard history?

  1. Hit the Windows + R keys to open the Run command.
  2. Type in sysdm.cpl and press Enter.
  3. Navigate to the Advanced tab and under Performance, select Settings.
  4. In the Performance Options window that opens, select the Advanced tab and under Virtual memory, click on Change.
  5. Uncheck the Automatically manage paging file size for all drives option and select the drive you wish to undertake the process.
  6. Click on Custom size and enter a value higher than the minimum size allowed then press OK.
  7. Restart your PC.

Once you do this, you should be able to copy more items onto your Clipboard. This should allow you to hold on to your Clipboard history for longer especially if you tend to copy lots of data. It is also important to note that this solution may not work on all versions of Windows.

If you are unlucky and this method does not work on your OS, don’t worry, we have excellent recommendations of Clipboard managers that do an equally great job or are even better than the built-in Windows version.

One advantage is that they have more features and you are less likely to run into a Windows Clipboard out of memory error message. Should you encounter any other related issues such as Clipboard history not working, don’t hesitate to refer to our comprehensive guide on the same.

We’d love to hear your thoughts on how this method worked for you so share your experience in the comment section below.

More about the topics: Windows 11