If your Desktop is littered with icons.

Or your Downloads folder is a sea of files.

Then maybe it’s time to get intentional with WHERE you are saving your downloads.

Google Chrome doesn’t do us any favors by defaulting to automatically putting files we download from email or other websites directly on our Desktop or Downloads folder.

But – yes, Kevin, there’s a better way (to save the files you download)…
(no, it never gets old)

Get Chrome to ask you where you want to save each file. How?

  1. Open Chrome’s settings with the three dots in the upper right:
  2. In the search bar at the top, type in “down”.
  3. Turn on the “Ask where to save each file before downloading” toggle.

Now… go somewhere on the web that you’d normally save a file from (Gmail is an easy one), and when you click Download, you’ll get a pop up – “where do you want to save this file”?

Now you get to make two decisions that you didn’t have a chance to use before:

  1. What folder to put the file in
  2. What to call the file you’re saving (if you don’t want the file name it comes with)

But… that’s more steps. Surely you wouldn’t tell me to click MORE times to do something, Dara?

I don’t know about you, but if I’m downloading a statement from my online banking, I don’t want YET ANOTHER file called “statement.pdf” in my downloads folder. It will serve far more purpose over the long term if I indicate the bank account it came from, and the year and month of the statement *and save it in the appropriate folder*.

And that’s what this pop up forces me to do.

We are doing the right thing TODAY will save you time, energy, focus, and possibly agony in future… yes, a couple more clicks, and marginally more time, but way more time saved in future.

This is one of those times when time spent up-front saves you time later and is well worth it. Trust me.