Does robocopy copies 'hidden' and/or 'system' files and folders by default?

When running robocopy using a most basic command such as

robocopy <Source> <Destination> /E

does it only copies what I would call 'regular' files and folders, or those with hidden and system attributes as well ?

The official doc at does not even mention hidden or system attributes (as of 2020-02-01).

For the record I'm on Windows 10 1909 (18363.592).

1 Answer

I did some tests.

First I disabled "Hide protected operating system files" in Folder options. Then I created some folders and files and changed their attributes in cmd using

attrib +s +h <folder or file path>

Then copying using the command

robocopy <Source> <Destination> /E

did in fact copy all files and folders, regardless of their system or hidden attributes.

Additionally, I tested copying the contents of the "real" system folder $Recycle.Bin to another folder. It did copy the contents although Windows Explorer does not display the original complex folder names in the destination folder.