How to Choose What ComfortFiles Opens With

Q: How do I stop ComfortFiles reopening my old tabs?

Open Settings ( ⌘, ) and set When ComfortFiles opens to My Mac or to a folder of your choice. Every launch then starts with a single tab there, instead of restoring the tabs you had open.

Q: Can ComfortFiles always open in the same folder?

Yes. In Settings ▸ When ComfortFiles opens , choose Choose Folder… and pick it. The folder is remembered by name in the menu afterwards, so switching away and back does not mean picking it again.

Q: Does turning off the session restore also forget my view settings?

No, and this is the part worth knowing: it resets where you are , not how things look . Tab count and folders are reset; view mode, icon size, column layout, sidebar width and the preview panel all come back exactly as you left them, taken from the tab that was active. A fresh start should not feel like amnesia.

Q: What is the default?

Restore last session — everything comes back as you left it. That is what the app has always done, so nothing changes for anyone who never opens this setting.

By default ComfortFiles reopens exactly where you were: the same tabs, the same folders, the same layout. Some people want that. Others want a clean window every time. Settings ▸ When ComfortFiles opens decides which.

Press ⌘,, and it is the first row of the General pane:

Choice	What a launch gives you
Restore last session (default)	Every tab and folder back as you left it
My Mac	One tab, on the disks-and-drives screen
A folder you pick	One tab, on that folder

What a fresh start keeps

The two non-default options reset where you are — how many tabs there are and what they point at. They deliberately keep how things look: view mode, icon size, column layout, sidebar width, and the preview panel, all taken from whichever tab was active when you quit. Your window comes back the same size, in the same place.

That split is the whole design. Dropping the appearance as well would make every launch feel like the app had forgotten you, which is not what “start fresh” means to anyone who asks for it.

Choosing a folder

Pick Choose Folder… and select it. Afterwards the folder appears in the menu by name, so you can switch to Restore last session for a while and come back to it without hunting for the path again.

If that folder is not reachable at launch — an external drive that is not plugged in, a network share that is not mounted — ComfortFiles opens My Mac for that launch and leaves the setting untouched. Connect the drive and the folder is back next time. An empty tab pointing at something that is not there would look like a bug; forgetting your choice because a cable was out would be worse.

Why this setting exists at all

Two reasons, and neither is a matter of taste.

File Explorer does not restore your windows. Reopening it on Windows gives you a fresh window. The one related option — Restore previous folder windows at logon — is off by default and is about logging in, not about reopening the app. So an always-on restore was the odd behaviour in an app built around Explorer habits. Windows 11 asks the same question openly as Open File Explorer to: Home / This PC.

macOS already asks it too. System Settings ▸ Desktop & Dock has Close windows when quitting an application, which governs exactly this for apps that use the system’s own window restoration. ComfortFiles keeps its own session file so that tabs, columns and panel widths survive, which means that system answer never reached us. This setting is where you give it directly.

Tabs — what is being restored, and how to work with several folders at once.
How to change the view and icon size — the appearance that a fresh start keeps.

Frequently asked questions

How do I stop ComfortFiles reopening my old tabs?

Open Settings (⌘,) and set When ComfortFiles opens to My Mac or to a folder of your choice. Every launch then starts with a single tab there, instead of restoring the tabs you had open.

Can ComfortFiles always open in the same folder?

Yes. In Settings ▸ When ComfortFiles opens, choose Choose Folder… and pick it. The folder is remembered by name in the menu afterwards, so switching away and back does not mean picking it again.

Does turning off the session restore also forget my view settings?

No, and this is the part worth knowing: it resets where you are, not how things look. Tab count and folders are reset; view mode, icon size, column layout, sidebar width and the preview panel all come back exactly as you left them, taken from the tab that was active. A fresh start should not feel like amnesia.

What happens if the folder I chose is on a drive that is not connected?

ComfortFiles opens My Mac for that launch and leaves your setting alone — so when the drive is plugged in again, the folder comes back on its own. It does not open an empty tab pointing at something that is not there, and it does not quietly forget your choice.

Does File Explorer on Windows reopen your windows?

No — and that is part of why this setting exists. Reopening File Explorer gives you a fresh window; its one related option, Restore previous folder windows at logon, is off by default and concerns logging in rather than reopening the app. Windows 11 does ask the related question directly, as Open File Explorer to: Home / This PC, which is the same choice in different words.

What is the default?

Restore last session — everything comes back as you left it. That is what the app has always done, so nothing changes for anyone who never opens this setting.