Say you have a website and want to offer free files to your visitors. Since your hosting service has limited storage space, you want to store the files to OneDrive as you have a premium account on it. Soon after sharing a file — via a link –, you realize that the file associated with the link is not directly downloaded. Then you are wondering, is there a way to make the file directly downloaded?

OneDrive indeed allows you to share a file with anyone via a link. But instead of directly downloading the file, the link will redirect you to a page associated with the file. You need to click the Download button on the page to download the file. It takes a little trick if you want to the link directly download the file.

First, login to OneDrive on the web browser. Select the file you want to share, then right-click and select Embed. This will open a panel on the right side.

Copy the code and paste it to Notepad or your favorite plain text editor.

The code you have just copied contains a link. Replace the text “embed” on the link and replace it with “download“.

Original link: https://onedrive.live.com/embed?cid=06CEBAC9BCD32EB6&resid=KGHKJHKGODGS%21141235&authkey=AJwkiFb610VECEk

Link after edit: https://onedrive.live.com/download?cid=06CEBAC9BCD32EB6&resid= KGHKJHKGODGS%21141235 &authkey=AJwkiFb610VECEk

After editing the link, you can place your link to any place you like (e.g., the button link on your website). Instead of redirecting you to the page of the file, it will directly download the file to your device.