How to remove the recycle bin from SharePoint Online quick launch

SharePoint is a great application. That being said, customisation makes most things better. One way you could customise SharePoint is by removing (or replacing) the links on your quick launch side panel. Albeit, removing the recycling bin link isn’t quite as simple as it is to remove other links. Fortunately, it’s still pretty easy. 

Solution: 

  1. Open your SharePoint site 
  2. Navigate to your SharePoint site’s settings 
  3. Click “Site collection features” under “Site collection administration” 
  4. Find and activate “SharePoint server publishing” 

This blog’s focus will primarily be the removal of the recycle bin from your SharePoint quick launch. Despite that, we’ll also be covering how you can remove the other links or disable quick launch all together. 

Quick links: 

Removing the recycle bin form SharePoint’s quick launch 

Step 1 – Open your SharePoint site 

  • Before we make any changes to a SharePoint site, we must at the very least have it open. So, get it done if you’d like to proceed. 

Step 2 – Open your SharePoint site’s contents 

  • We need to get to our site’s settings page to being making changes. We can do so by accessing site contents. This is due to the link that resides there. 

Step 3 – Open your SharePoint site’s settings 

  • We need to get to our site’s settings page to being making changes. We can do so by accessing site contents. This is due to the link that resides there. 

Step 4 – Open your SharePoint site’s settings 

  • Click the link shown to access your SharePoint site’s settings page. Once in, we can work towards reaching the site collection features page. 

Step 5 – Locate and activate SharePoint server publishing feature 

  • Have a scroll and look through the list for SharePoint server publishing if you have time. Alternatively use ctrl+f (cmd+f on macOs) to search for it. 
  • Select activate to enable the feature 
  • Please note it may take some time to activate 

Removing links from a SharePoint site’s quick launch 

Step 1 – Open your SharePoint site 

  • Before we make any changes to a SharePoint site, we must at the very least have it open. So, get it done if you’d like to proceed. 

Step 2 – Open your SharePoint site’s contents 

  • We need to get to our site’s settings page to being making changes. We can do so by accessing site contents. This is due to the link that resides there. 

Step 3 – Open your SharePoint site’s settings 

  • We need to get to our site’s settings page to being making changes. We can do so by accessing site contents. This is due to the link that resides there. 

Step 4 – Select Navigation Elements under Look and Feel 

  • In settings, find and locate Navigation Elements under the Look and Feel category of options. 

Step 5 – Select EDIT LINKS 

  • Select the EDIT LINKS link shown in red. 
  • Segment in blue references the prompt needed to toggle quick launches visability. 

Step 6 – Add and remove links as you please 

  • X button is used to remove a link while the + link button is used to add more links to quick launch. 

End note 

Recap 

Finishing up, we’ve gone over the deletion of the recycle bin link in your SharePoint site’s quick launch, as well as the removal of regular links and very briefly, how you can hide your entire quick launch. 

Farewell 

As usual, this section is dedicated to thanking readers for their support. We’d be pleased to know you found this post useful and/or informative. If you have any more SharePoint related queries, please consult our related articles (listed below). However, if you have other queries, consider looking at the rest of the site. We’re frequently posting new stuff each week and may just have the guide or troubleshooting tips you need. Regardless, we wish you a good day/night. Farewell readers. 

Our related articles: 

  • How to unsync SharePoint folder from desktop – When a user uses the OneDrive sync client to synchronize a SharePoint Document library, the whole library of files and folders is transferred to the user’s PC. It is not, however, simply replicated. Between the user’s PC and SharePoint, a two-way relationship is formed. Any changes in one location are immediately reflected in the other. This is unwanted behaviour if you intend to merely copy. As such we’ll be showing you how to unsync SharePoint. 
  • A guide to checking the size of a folder in SharePoint – SharePoint sites contain a lot of data. All of which takes up space. Due to this, the importance of tracking folder storage consumption is high. Despite this, not many know how to check a folder’s size. This post aims to change that. 
  • SharePoint: can’t add site members: Causes and fixes – SharePoint servers as a collaborative document manager. As such, the collaboration-based functionality is about as important as the management functionality. Despite that, SharePoint may on occasion run into issues adding site members- in this blog we’ll be running through some causes and discussing fixes. 
  • What is the simplest way to transfer files from Google Suite to SharePoint? – If you’ve decided on switching from the Google Suite to the Office 365 Suite, you may be a little baffled as to how to go about it. Fortunately for you, we’ve got a better method than re-downloading and uploading everything one-by-one. Have a read to find out more. 

Jack Mitchell

Jack Mitchell has been the Operations manager at telecoms and MSP Optionbox for more than 4 years. He has played a crucial role in the company, from marketing to helpdesk, and ensures that the IT requirements of over 300 clients are continuously met. With his innate passion for technology and troubleshooting and a particular interest in Apple products, Jack now delivers the most comprehensive tech guides to make your life easier. You can connect with Jack on LinkedIn.

Recent Posts