On Android, files or folders can not be hidden the same way as on a desktop PC. That’s because Android runs on Linux base, which has no hidden attribute for files or folders.
Some users expect to be able to hide some files same way as it’s possible on Windows. This won’t work on Android.
Dot method
One convenience way of hiding files on Linux (and Android) is to put ‘.’ (dot) in front of file name. This is respected in many file managers and galleries. To hide a file or folder this way, you need to rename your file/folder yourself – add dot in front of name.
Hiding in X-plore
Additionally to this, X-plore offers Hide function on local files, but it works only in X-plore. Such marked files are then shown as hidden in X-plore (or not shown, depending on your settings to see hidden files).
ⓘ By default X-plore hides certain common (and generally useless) folders, such as Alarms, Audiobooks, Podcasts, etc. You can show hidden folders and unhide these if you wish.
.nomedia
There is also another option for media files – if folder contains a file named .nomedia (this can be empty file), then Android Media scanner won’t scan media files in this folder and sub-folders, and media files stored here should not show in media players and galleries. “Should” is right word, because Android’s Media scanner is buggy, and often won’t notice adding/removing of this .nomedia file. Don’t complain to X-plore, this is Media Scanner that manages visibility of media files to user. But after device restart, Android attempts to scan files and fix possible inconsistency.
X-plore adds/removes this .nomedia file for folders that you mark/unmark as hidden in X-plore. The rest is up to Android system to deal with it and show or not show media files in other apps.
Hiding top-level drives
It is also possible to hide some unwanted file-system drives shown as top level items. Although this is rarely needed, on some devices X-plore may be showing same drive with different paths, so in such case user may hide some drives. Use same hide/unhide functions that works for hiding files.
To show such hidden drives, click Show button at bottom of list and choose to show hidden storage. Or long-click Show hidden button to show/hide hidden drives.