Windows updating issue

Bug Reports
1

Where does the bug appear (feature/product)?

Somewhere else…

Describe the Bug

I’m posting, as the latest version as of 11/08 is still facing the update issues in the thread Installing Cursor Update Fails on Windows - #19 which was closed. It is truly frustrating and should be fixed.

Steps to Reproduce

Please see Installing Cursor Update Fails on Windows - #19 - the first update works, after that all the updates fail no matter restarts, killing cursor processes, etc.

Ι click update and then I see the Updating Cursor… window just keep playing the progress bar, until finally it throws an error:

Nov 08 23:29:14.804 INFO Starting: C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe, false, Updating Cursor…
Nov 08 23:29:14.805 INFO Checking for running Cursor.exe processes… (attempt 1)
Nov 08 23:29:14.832 INFO Cursor.exe is not running
Nov 08 23:29:14.832 INFO Checking for possible conflicting running processes… (attempt 1)
Nov 08 23:29:14.864 INFO Inno Updater v0.13.0
Nov 08 23:29:14.864 INFO Starting update, silent = false
Nov 08 23:29:15.140 INFO do_update: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe”, _
Nov 08 23:29:15.140 INFO move_update: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\unins000.dat”, _
Nov 08 23:29:15.142 INFO Reading directory: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor”
Nov 08 23:29:15.142 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\chrome_100_percent.pak” (attempt 1)
Nov 08 23:29:15.142 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\chrome_200_percent.pak” (attempt 1)
Nov 08 23:29:15.142 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe” (attempt 1)
Nov 08 23:29:15.192 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe” (attempt 2)
Nov 08 23:29:15.393 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe” (attempt 3)
Nov 08 23:29:15.843 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe” (attempt 4)
Nov 08 23:29:16.644 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe” (attempt 5)
Nov 08 23:29:17.894 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe” (attempt 6)
Nov 08 23:29:19.695 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe” (attempt 7)
Nov 08 23:29:22.145 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe” (attempt 8)
Nov 08 23:29:25.346 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe” (attempt 9)
Nov 08 23:29:29.396 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe” (attempt 10)
Nov 08 23:29:34.396 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe” (attempt 11)
Nov 08 23:29:40.446 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe” (attempt 12)
Nov 08 23:29:47.646 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe” (attempt 13)
Nov 08 23:29:56.096 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe” (attempt 14)
Nov 08 23:30:05.896 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe” (attempt 15)
Nov 08 23:30:17.145 INFO Get file handle: “C:\Users\patob\AppData\Local\Programs\cursor\Cursor.exe” (attempt 16)
Nov 08 23:30:32.747 ERRO Failed to create file handle: The process cannot access the file because it is being used by another process.

Expected Behavior

It should just update. On my Mac the update is flawless.

Operating System

Windows 10/11

Current Cursor Version (Menu → About Cursor → Copy)

Version: 2.0.54 (user setup)
VSCode Version: 1.99.3
Commit: 7a31bffd467aa2d9adfda69076eb924e9062cb20
Date: 2025-11-03T22:40:44.657Z
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 10.0.26200

Additional Information

Workaround based on the other thread:

  1. Open up a Powershell
  2. Run

Get-ChildItem -Path $env:TEMP -Directory -Filter “vscode-stable-user-x64*” | Sort-Object LastWriteTime -Descending | Select-Object -First 1 | Get-ChildItem -Filter “*.exe” | Select-Object -First 1 | ForEach-Object { $_.FullName }

  1. Run the exe file, that is the updater, if you want, you can add /SILENT or /VERYSILENT (/HELP for the command line args)

Does this stop you from using Cursor

No - Cursor works, but with this issue

2

Hey, thanks for the report.

This is a known issue affecting some Windows users and the team is aware.

Quick workaround - please try downloading directly via the update API:
User setup: https://api2.cursor.sh/updates/download/golden/win32-x64/cursor/2.0
System setup: https://api2.cursor.sh/updates/download/golden/win32-x64-system/cursor/2.0

I’ll escalate this to the team and link your report to the existing ticket.

Could you also share:

  • Any antivirus or security software running?
  • Anything unusual in Task Manager that might be holding file handles on Cursor.exe?

Let me know if the API download works better than the temp folder method.

3

Hi, yes, removing McAffee helped, I confirm that it works without it, I managed to update through two cycles - though it doesn’t restart automatically, after the update it just stops, and I have to manually restart Cursor, but that’s a truly minor thing.

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