Access is denied error, when I mklink on Windows 7

Question

My home directory is c:\Users\phi as a user phi, and I made a directory at c:\Users\abc. I need to symbolic link from c:\Users\phi\hello to c:\Users\abc\hello.

I run the following command

mklink c:\Users\abc\hello c:\Users\phi\hello

But I get the Access is denied error. User phi is Administrator, so I have no problem writing files in c:\Users\abc.

Why is this? How to mklink?

score 44 · Answer 1 · edited Jan 08 '17 at 22:29

44

Important points:

You need to run as admin if UAC is on. (or at least security policy to allow creation of links).
The /D switch needs to be used if the link is for directory.
First parameter is a link, second parameter is the original folder.
Link should not exist already.

Usage:

mklink /D c:\users\me\new_link\ c:\users\me\original_folder\

edited Jan 08 '17 at 22:29

kenorb

26,615

answered Sep 11 '12 at 14:48

rpattabi

731

prosseek · Accepted Answer · 2014-02-20T12:42:01.993

27

I found an answer from this site. In short, I should have run cmd.exe as Administrator.

edited Feb 20 '14 at 12:42

answered Sep 28 '10 at 15:13

prosseek

6,054

score 21 · Answer 3 · answered Dec 16 '11 at 00:59

Note that the same error will be presented when you try to create junctions on mapped drives. I was pulling my hair out on this until I came across the examples on this page on MSDN Hard Links and Junctions.

Short answer: you can only use mklink on local volumes.

Cornelius Dol · Answer 4 · 2017-05-03T20:21:10.363

In Windows 7 (and later) you need a special security privilege to create links and junctions. As administrator you can grant this permission to users using secpol.msc to set Local Policies\User Rights Assignment\Create symbolic links.

If the user is logged on at the time, they will need to log off and back on to be able to create links.

Note the caution that links can expose security weaknesses in some apps - I have not researched what those weaknesses might be.

score 12 · Answer 5 · answered Mar 12 '14 at 11:17

If you're frequently using Linux, remember that the parameters are swapped on Windows.

If you use the wrong order, you'll get an "Access Denied", too. Because you're trying to create a symbolic link where the original already exists.

Windows: mklink /D link original

Linux: ln -s original link

score 4 · Answer 6 · edited Aug 18 '11 at 00:48

4

I was getting this because I accidentally ran mklink /D against a file. The link wasn't showing in explorer but it did in Windows Explorer. Using the Command Prompt I deleted the original invalid directory link and then recreated it without the /D option.

By the way, I was getting the "Access is denied" error even though I was running cmd.exe as an administrator.

edited Aug 18 '11 at 00:48

Gareth

19,080

answered Aug 17 '11 at 21:35

Peter Joles

41

score 2 · Answer 7 · answered Oct 26 '12 at 09:54

2

If you run:

mklink /j C:\path_to_link C:\destination

it should work. In my case, powershell and cmd produced the same output. For powershell you only have to start the command with

cmd /c mklink...

answered Oct 26 '12 at 09:54

modmoto

167

score 1 · Answer 8 · edited Jan 21 '12 at 15:40

1

Apart from running mklink as Administrator you also should make sure that you have enough permissions to the destination folder you are linking to.

edited Jan 21 '12 at 15:40

Simon Sheehan

9,204

answered Jan 17 '12 at 14:21

Martin Wildam

19

score 0 · Answer 9 · edited Feb 16 '23 at 19:50

0

This might sound weird but make sure that the file or folder you are trying to create doesn't already exist. Sometimes, it's easy to overlook that in the cmd prompt.

edited Feb 16 '23 at 19:50

Community

1

answered Apr 08 '11 at 18:51

David d C e Freitas

5,000

score 0 · Answer 10 · answered Apr 20 '12 at 04:11

0

For directories you have to do:

mklink /D c:\Users\abc\hello c:\Users\phi\hello

answered Apr 20 '12 at 04:11

Zequez

1,652

Access is denied error, when I mklink on Windows 7

10 Answers10

Linked