How do I scale the enormously sized desktop icons on Ubuntu 18.04?

Solution 1:

  1. Open Files (aka Nautilus)
  2. Grid view: Change your icon view from "list" to "grid" first by clicking the button next to the hamburger menu.

    screenshot

  3. Zoom out: Click on the hamburger menu (three-horizontal-lined button at top-right) and decrease the icon size by clicking the "zoom out" button (or Ctrl+-).

This should also reduce the size of the icons in your desktop.

Solution 2:

You can also resize icons by right clicking on each icons and select resize. Then you resize it up to a certain allowed minimum.

Solution 3:

In case you have a wheel mouse

Open Nautilus and click on the show directory as symbols icon (middle of the button on the top-right of nautilus's window) an press Ctrl+Scroll Mouse up/down.