How to forcefully clear all jobs from a print queue

Posted on March 11, 2007 at 1:12 am

All administrators should know how to clear the print queue in Windows when all the jobs get “stuck” and none of the jobs can be deleted. This will save you from having to restart a server (which is bad!).

In order to get the printing services back up and running, follow these steps:

1. Go to Start, Control Panel and Administrative Tools. Double click on Services icon.

2. Scroll down to the Print Spooler service and right click on it and select Stop. In order to do this, you need to be logged in as Administrator. At this point, no one will be able to print anything on any of the printers that are being hosted on this server.

3. Next you need to go to the following directory: C:\WINDOWS\System32\spool\PRINTERS. Delete all the files in this folder. This will clear all print queues (it’s a good idea to first make sure there are no other print jobs being processed on any of the other printers on the server because doing this step will delete those jobs also)

4. Now you can go back to the Services console and right-click and choose Start for the Print Spooler service!

You can also go to a command prompt and type net stop spooler or net start spooler to start and stop the service.

Good luck!

» Filed Under Computer Tips

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Comments

16 Responses to “How to forcefully clear all jobs from a print queue”

  1. Amanda said on : June 3rd, 2008 at 10:10 am

    Thanks for this! Exactly what I was looking for after a Google search!


  2. Scott said on : October 10th, 2008 at 10:27 am

    This is great, but is there a way to create a script that can be run from a user’s workstation to clear the queue on a remote server without having to log into that server? That’s what I’m looking for!


  3. John Sainsbury said on : October 20th, 2008 at 4:32 pm

    Just what I was looking for. Our 2000 server has print server devices, and queues get stuck. Administering via terminal service no problem.


  4. Rick said on : November 11th, 2008 at 9:40 am

    Here is a simple script i know of. Just save that as a .BAT file from notepad after modifying it to your machine. Just modify the path to your print spool, save and run it.

    net stop spooler
    del /f C:Windows\System32\spool\printers\*.*
    net start spooler


  5. Gabrielle said on : January 27th, 2009 at 3:02 pm

    Thanks, I needed that path. I knew there was someplace like that out there but couldn’t remember it. Unfortunately, I can’t delete anything in there. The two files say they’re in use when I try to delete them. Probably by the darn print queue.


  6. Aarti said on : May 13th, 2009 at 12:43 pm

    Thanks for the solution! Printers are all printing again!


  7. billfranke said on : July 22nd, 2009 at 1:03 am

    Thank you, Computer Guy, for the tip, and thank you, Rick, for the *.bat file. Just what I need. There is now always a queue of pending jobs that have already been printed — usually by my Adobe PDF printer. I can always delete them all if I do it when there are only 5 recent jobs or so, but last night (July 21) I tried to delete about 10. The one from July 9 refused to go away. Only 8 bytes, but it stayed and stayed and stayed!


  8. Mohammed Aslam said on : August 28th, 2009 at 5:42 am

    Hi,

    We had print server installed on our network and some of the print queues are getting stuck on some printers. Due to this, users are not able print from these printers. If we stop the spooler service on print server other printers will be affected. Here is my question: how to delete the queues on affected printer without disturbing other printers?

    Thanks


  9. Craig said on : October 14th, 2009 at 2:34 pm

    just saved me a 6hr wait for the help desk, thanks!


  10. Cristina said on : October 30th, 2009 at 8:09 am

    Worked like a charm. Thanks!


  11. Saroj Shrestha said on : November 3rd, 2009 at 3:47 am

    Hi there thanks for the tips, but we have over 30 printers connected and we cannot afford to ’stop print spooler service’, which would cause other printer to stop printing.
    Is there any other way to clear the jobs from the print queue, without stopping the service?

    Many thanks,
    Saroj
    Oxford


  12. Almostillmatic said on : November 22nd, 2009 at 10:47 pm

    Exactly what I needed. Thank you for the simple solution. Printers are back up and running!


  13. Bob said on : December 9th, 2009 at 1:38 pm

    Wow, that worked great and it was badly needed. Thank you for the instructions. We are up and running once again!


  14. Bruce said on : December 11th, 2009 at 9:30 am

    Worked perfect, but I still had to go back and clear the queue one last time. You may want to add that to the write-up.


  15. Le@ndro said on : December 11th, 2009 at 12:26 pm

    Really great! I was tired of restarting the print server all the time.

    BIG thanks!


  16. sb said on : December 23rd, 2009 at 11:23 am

    You’re a hero – thanks! My print queue is no longer jammed up! Added to my favourites!


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