Windows 10 desktop disappeared

A Windows 10 user contacted me because the desktop had disappeared.

The first thing to check is if Windows is in “Tablet mode” which disables the desktop.

• Go to the Control panel
• Search for “tablet” and click on “Table mode settings”
• In the “When I sign in” change from “Use the apropriate mode for my hardware” to “Use desktop mode”
• Log out and log back in again

If this doesn’t help the user profile might have become broken. In this case, the solution is (description below is just short notes taken from my memory):

• Go to the Control panel and select accounts
• Create a new account
• Using a user with administrative rights, copy the content from the users folders like desktop, documents etc to the new user’s folder.
• Log in using the new user