Window cursor delete bug

Support Bug Reports
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1

Where does the bug appear (feature/product)?

Cursor IDE

Describe the Bug

Failed to install Cursor update.
Updates may fail due to anti-virus software and/or runaway processes. Please try restarting your machine before attempting to update again.

Please read the log file for more information:

C:\Users\SAMSUNG\AppData\Local\Temp\cursor-inno-updater-1784184638.log

There was an error while deleting a directory:
“C:\Users\SAMSUNG\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\resources”:
Access is denied. (os error 5)
Please verify there are no Cursor processes still executing.

Steps to Reproduce

Steps to Reproduce
Open the Cursor editor and use it normally.

Close the Cursor application.

Every time after closing Cursor, when attempting to reopen it or run an update, the background process fails to terminate completely and throws an error.

It fails with the error message: Failed to install Cursor update pointing to a Temp log file.

Further investigation shows an os error 5 (Access is denied) when trying to delete or modify the “C:\Users\SAMSUNG\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\resources” directory, even though no visible Cursor windows are open.

Screenshots / Screen Recordings

20260716_160529.png
20260716_160529.png846×353 16.4 KB

Operating System

Windows 10/11

Version Information

CursorUserSetup-x64-3.11.25

Does this stop you from using Cursor

Cursor crashes or freezes when closing the application, leaving background processes running that cause file lock issues upon restart.

5

Hey, thanks for the report. This is a known issue with the Windows auto-updater. During an update, the installer deletes the ...\Programs\cursor\resources folder, but if a Cursor background process (or antivirus or EDR) is holding a file handle, the delete fails with Access is denied (os error 5) and the install breaks. This is a bug on our side, it’s being tracked, but I can’t share an ETA for a fix yet.

How to recover right now:

  • Reinstall Cursor from Cursor · Download. Your settings and extensions are stored in %APPDATA%\Cursor and %USERPROFILE%\.cursor, so they’ll stay. Only the app binary is lost.
  • Before restarting or shutting down Windows, fully quit Cursor, including the tray icon. The message “verify there are no Cursor processes still executing” is literal. The process can really keep running in the background.

To reduce the chance it happens again:

  • Disable auto-update: Settings → search update.mode → set it to none, then update manually.
  • If you have antivirus or endpoint protection, add an exclusion for %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\cursor so it doesn’t hold file handles during updates.

Let me know if the issue comes back after reinstalling.