Delete all files and folders but exclude a subfolder

Question

I have a folder where I need to delete all files and folders except a small list of files and folders.

I can already exclude a list of files, but don\'t see a way to

Answer 1

I use this approach assuming you want to exclude some files or folders at root level but then you want to delete everything inside them.

C:.
├───delme1
│   │   delme.txt
│   │
│   └───delmetoo
├───delme2
├───folder1
│       keepmesafe.txt
│
└───folder2

So you want to delete everything and preserver the folder1 and folder2

Get-ChildItem -Exclude folder1,folder2 | Remove-Item -Recurse -Force

There are many other solutions but I found this easy to understand and remember.