In File Explorer, hard links appear as normal files—there's no special icon or overlay. This is both a feature (no clutter) and a danger (easy to forget they're linked).
Every hard link points to the same underlying data on the storage volume. windows hard link
If you need independent versions, use copy (or copy-on-write features like ReFS block cloning). In File Explorer, hard links appear as normal
(Get-Item "link.txt").LinkType # Output: HardLink If you need independent versions, use copy (or
| Feature | Hard Link | Symbolic Link | |---------|-----------|----------------| | Points to | File data (inode) | Pathname (string) | | Survives target deletion | Yes (data still exists) | No (becomes broken) | | Works across volumes | No | Yes | | Works with directories | No (by design) | Yes (with privilege) | | Relative paths | N/A | Yes | | Network paths | No | Yes (UNC paths) |
Windows explicitly blocks creating hard links to directories (NTFS supports them, but Windows disables it to prevent infinite recursion and other filesystem nightmares).
Every NTFS file has a —the number of directory entries pointing to its data.
