How to uninstall Kiro on Windows

Kiro's CLI reference describes %USERPROFILE%\.kiro, the folder behind its KIRO_HOME setting, as the home of your global agents, prompts, skills, steering, settings and sessions. Removing the app does not remove that folder, so decide on its own whether you want to keep it. This guide covers Kiro installed per-user from the Amazon.Kiro winget package. Kiro CLI reference

Quit Kiro first

Save your work and close every Kiro window. Check Task Manager (Ctrl+Shift+Esc) for any Kiro.exe still listed before you uninstall.

Remove the app with its own uninstaller

Go to Settings › Apps › Installed apps, find Kiro, and choose Uninstall, or run:

winget uninstall --id Amazon.Kiro

Back up before you remove data

Copy %APPDATA%\Kiro to keep editor settings, and %USERPROFILE%\.kiro to keep global agents, prompts, skills and sessions, before you clear either one.

Where the data lives

Location	What it holds	What to do
`%APPDATA%\Kiro`	Editor settings and the app's own caches	Back this up first; the uninstaller does not remove it
`%APPDATA%\Kiro\Cache`, `Code Cache`, `GPUCache` and `logs`	Editor caches and logs	Safe to remove after quitting
`%USERPROFILE%\.kiro`	Global agents, prompts, skills, steering, settings and sessions, shared with the Kiro CLI	Keep it if you use the Kiro CLI or plan to reinstall; otherwise back it up and remove it yourself
`%USERPROFILE%\.kiro-shared`	A second Kiro data folder	Same decision as `.kiro`

Check the result

Run these read-only commands after the uninstall finishes:

Get-Process Kiro -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
winget list --id Amazon.Kiro
Test-Path "$env:LOCALAPPDATA\Programs\Kiro"
Test-Path "$env:APPDATA\Kiro"
Test-Path "$env:USERPROFILE\.kiro"

No output from Get-Process only means this query observed no matching process; a suppressed error leaves the running state unknown. A listed process means a window or helper is still open.
A completed winget list query with no match means the package record is gone; a matching row means the uninstall did not finish.
The first Test-Path returning False means the program folder is gone; True means files remain there.
Test-Path "$env:APPDATA\Kiro" returning True means your editor settings and caches are still there, which is expected unless you removed them yourself.
Test-Path "$env:USERPROFILE\.kiro" returning True means your agents, prompts and sessions are still there, which is expected because uninstalling Kiro does not touch that folder.

If you installed it with winget

winget uninstall runs the same uninstaller Settings › Apps uses and removes the same program files; it does not touch %APPDATA%\Kiro, .kiro or .kiro-shared on its own.

Account and subscription

Uninstalling does not sign you out of a connected account. Check your Kiro account status separately.

What Mole lists

For Kiro installed per-user from winget:

The program folder and the Start Menu folder are selected by default.
%APPDATA%\Kiro\Cache, Code Cache, GPUCache and logs are selected by default.
%APPDATA%\Kiro itself is listed but not selected.
If a kiro:// link registration still points at the removed program, Mole lists it and backs it up to a .reg file first.
Mole also lists a file-type association key for each extension Kiro can open; in this test the app had not written most of them to the registry, since Kiro only registers a file type the first time you set it as the default opener for that extension.

The rule added on September 29 lists %USERPROFILE%\.kiro and %USERPROFILE%\.kiro-shared for review without selecting them. Their removal has not been retested on the VM; check the review in the version you use. Keep them if another Kiro tool still uses them.

What this test covered

Tested with Kiro 1.1.70 installed through winget, per-user scope, on an ARM64 test VM. The test installed it from an elevated session, so its uninstaller asked for administrator access; a normal per-user install does not. Kiro was not signed in during this test.