01 / Navigate
Two panes. One decision.
Keep source and destination visible, with independent tabs, filters, history, selection, and layouts.
Windows 11 / Local-first / Read-only by default
Your files.
Shared control.
Browse, search, analyze, and move files at speed—then let Codex safely operate the exact pane and folder already open.
No pasted paths. No screen scraping. No guessing whether an action actually worked.
Open source
Per-user install
No admin for normal use
Exact folder permissions
- 01Find it
- 02See what is huge
- 03Preview the move
- 04Open a shell here
- 05Act with AI here
One Windows workspace / Files + terminal + AI
Find it. Fix it. Keep moving.
Stop losing your place between tools.
Search across drives, expose wasted space, preview file moves, open a real terminal, and give Codex the exact working folder—without rebuilding context.
Your files stay local
Replace the Explorer window pile.
Fast navigation, storage insight, safe operations, terminals, and AI in one workspace.
Download for Windows
A better file manager before the AI even arrives
Stay in the flow.
Replace the pile of Explorer windows, path rebuilding, separate disk tools, and blind file operations with one inspectable workspace.
02 / Understand
Find what is eating the drive.
Move from total volume usage to the exact file with logical and allocated bytes kept distinct.
03 / Act
Know what happens before it happens.
Preview conflicts, stage work safely, recover after interruption, and keep undo evidence.
PlanStageCommitRecover
04 / Build
A real shell, already in the right folder.
Every file tab can own a persistent ConPTY terminal. Open it when needed; stop rebuilding paths by hand.
Explore Better v0.2.5 / reliable shared control
The AI can act. You can see why.
Stable semantic actions replace brittle screen coordinates. The 0.2.5 hotfix also keeps default-folder launches inside the installed app and restores preview-protected Paste and Send To workflows.
01 / Semantic control
Operate the app, not its pixels.
AI clients discover named actions with input schemas, disabled reasons, stale-context protection, expected outcomes, and no selector or script escape hatch.
- List22 safe actions
- ValidateContext + inputs
- InvokeOne event path
- ObserveCorrelated result
32 typed tools
6 resources
43 controlled views
02 / Devices
Know where every action goes.
Connected devices, drives, Libraries, and Windows locations show only capabilities they actually support—with explicit in-app and File Explorer labels.
03 / Diagnostics
Health you can inspect locally.
Ten bounded component checks, foreground scheduler metrics, and a privacy-safe support bundle make failures understandable without uploading your files.
04 / Recovery
Every operation tells its story.
Queue, phase changes, progress, pause, cancellation, retry, Undo, failure, completion, and crash recovery form one bounded chronological timeline.
- QueuedPlan accepted
- StagingDestination prepared
- CommittedVisible result verified
- RecoverableUndo evidence retained
05 / Foreground first
Background work knows when to yield.
Prefetch and indexing pause for navigation, search, analysis, operations, and hidden windows—then resume without duplicating cached work.
25.4 mslisting p95 under mixed foreground load
One workspace / two operators
Your AI sees—and safely operates—the folder you mean.
Explore Better turns the visible pane, tabs, selection, and authorized roots into structured local context and bounded actions. Your AI can find, inspect, compare, navigate, and reveal results without screen scraping or a general-purpose shell.
- Read-only firstStart with discovery and analysis. Writes stay absent until you explicitly add them.
- Exact rootsEach client receives its own folders, tools, limits, and revocable profile.
- Visible resultsThe AI can reveal its answer back in the pane you are already looking at.
- Typed actionsValidated inputs, disabled reasons, revision checks, and event-driven outcomes replace brittle clicks.
You
Find the launch README in the folder I have open and show it here.
- 01Get Live ContextActive pane, open tabs, selection, authorized root9 ms
- 02Search FilesREADME.md / 18 fixture entries scanned51 ms
- 03Reveal in Explore BetterREADME.md shown in the active left pane36 ms
Found and revealed—without a pasted path.
Measured on the same Windows fixture
Fast where waiting breaks thought.
The app does not make the model think faster. It makes the file work around the model immediate, structured, and bounded.
Filename Search
1.5 ms through the running host versus 222.4 ms for a fresh PowerShell baseline.
Duplicate Analysis
46.5 ms to group content duplicates versus 247.6 ms for the comparison pipeline.
Disk Analysis
51.4 ms through the Analyzer path versus 239.9 ms for the comparison script.
100K First Paint
Median of three current acceptance runs while keeping rendering bounded to 47 rows.
Warm MCP Bridge p95
Measured across 100 warm calls to the local sidecar and running application.
Semantic View p95
All 43 controlled views opened, rendered, published state, and closed with no page or console errors.
Benchmarks are evidence, not universal speed claims. A warm persistent shell may be faster than the fresh PowerShell baseline; hardware, volume, security software, and directory contents also change results.
Read the method and raw evidence
Local should still mean controlled
Power without the blank cheque.
No shell through MCP
The AI Bridge exposes file-manager tools, not arbitrary command execution or terminal control.
Folder-scoped profiles
Authorize only the roots a client needs, then revoke that profile without disturbing the others.
Preview, journal, recover
Write access requires a current plan and one-use token before it reaches the recoverable operation queue.
Download / verify / run
Try the workspace
from the demo.
Explore Better is a free, open-source public preview distributed through GitHub. The installer hash is published, normal use needs no administrator access, and Windows Explorer remains available.
- Local-first Windows app
- Read-only AI profile recommended first
- Exact backups before client configuration changes
- Reversible Explorer integration
Unsigned public preview
Windows will show “Unknown publisher” on first run.
Download Explore Better v0.2.5
Windows x64 / 107.7 MiB / Per-user installer / GitHub Release
Verify before opening
SHA256SUMS.txt
Get-FileHash .\ExploreBetter-0.2.5-x64-setup.exe -Algorithm SHA256
71a5d868aab5e56e0b3a1ac8d995d056deb7c2df50201c2f1c090b51712af006
What should I expect from SmartScreen?
Windows may open a “Windows protected your PC” dialog naming this installer and listing the publisher as unknown. Confirm the filename and SHA-256 above before deciding whether to use More info and Run anyway. Never disable SmartScreen globally.