Explorer not working in cursor

Support Bug Reports
1

Where does the bug appear (feature/product)?

Cursor IDE

Describe the Bug

I cant see the explorer any more in cursor. I reinstalled cursor as last resort. Still I don’t see the browser. I tried all the options Ctrl+Shift+E, through command palette etcc.
I can see the ‘explorer’ heading on top and explorer icon on the left. but there is not directory or files shown below the heading.

Steps to Reproduce

This is on Windows 11 pro.
option 1 - Open Cursor. Open any folder on your disk.
option 2 - Right click on a folder in windows explorer and choose open with cursor.

Expected Behavior

I should see the folder i have opened under the explorer. I should be able browse the directory structure, select file to open in cursor editor widow.

Screenshots / Screen Recordings

Screenshot 2025-12-27 180150.png
Screenshot 2025-12-27 180150.png1919×1138 70.2 KB

Operating System

Windows 10/11

Current Cursor Version (Menu → About Cursor → Copy)

Version: 2.2.44 (user setup)
VSCode Version: 1.105.1
Commit: 20adc1003928b0f1b99305dbaf845656ff81f5d0
Date: 2025-12-24T21:41:47.598Z
Electron: 37.7.0
Chromium: 138.0.7204.251
Node.js: 22.20.0
V8: 13.8.258.32-electron.0
OS: Windows_NT x64 10.0.26100

Additional Information

I tried various aitools - chatgpt, gemini etc and tried all the suggestions. could not get the explorer working. VC code works fine. When i open the folder in vscode, I can see the folder properly.
Cursor on my other computers working properly.
Reinstalling cursor did not work.

Does this stop you from using Cursor

Yes - Cursor is unusable

2

To add -
same the explorer works perfectly in vscode and antigravity on the same pc.
This happened after I updated cursor today. It used to work normally before.

4

Hey, thanks for the report.

Your screenshot shows something interesting. The crewai-pa-orchestrator-full-main folder is open (you can see it in the window title and in the terminal at D:\vsprojects\crewai-pa-orchestrator-full-main), but the file tree is completely missing in Explorer. You only see OPEN EDITORS, OUTLINE, and TIMELINE, but not the actual file tree.

This looks like a layout or views issue, not a project data issue. Please try the following:

  1. Reset the Explorer view:
  • Press Ctrl+Shift+P, type: View: Reset View Locations
  • Restart Cursor
  1. Check if the Folders view is hidden:
  • Right-click the EXPLORER header
  • Make sure “Folders” (or the project view) is checked
  1. Or via the Command Palette:
  • Press Ctrl+Shift+P, run: Explorer: Focus on Folders View

Also try starting Cursor with cursor --disable-extensions first to rule out an extension conflict.

5

Thank you Dean. The cursor --disable-extensions did not work, but

  • Reset View Locations worked.

Appreciate your help.