Windows 11 not refreshing

Finally succeeded!
I’m running Windows 11 Home on a Lenovo and have been extremely frustrated that File Explorer wouldn’t refresh automatically. I tried tinkering with registry keys, clearing caches, and searching for Auto-refresh settings (which I don’t have), but none of that was the issue.

On several forums I visited, I came across a small detail mentioning that third-party programs could interfere with the process and prevent refreshing. In my case, McAfee was pre-installed on my laptop (it triggered every time I downloaded a file or program). I thought I had fully uninstalled it previously, but remnants were still left behind.

Then I found a guide on how to completely remove McAfee – https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/all/guide-for-completely-removing-mcafee/5faf0655-10c1-4315-bc7b-2d91065e6a6a – and after following the steps (mainly downloading the MCPR tool and running a complete uninstallation), believe it or not, File Explorer started working perfectly!

Absolutely thrilled to have finally solved this problem. Hope this helps someone else too!