How to Stop Automatic Updates in Windows 11

As a Windows 11 user, it's important to keep your operating system up-to-date with the latest updates. These updates can patch vulnerabilities, improve performance, and add new features to your system. By default, Windows 11 is set to download and install updates automatically, including feature, quality, driver, security, and other important updates.

However, sometimes updates themselves can cause issues and make your system unstable. This is especially true for newer operating systems like Windows 11, which are still working out some of the kinks. If you're experiencing problems with your system after a recent update, it may be better to wait for a more stable release.

Another issue with automatic updates is that they can interrupt your work by prompting you to restart your system at inconvenient times. This can be frustrating and disruptive to your workflow.

Luckily, there are ways to pause, block, or turn off automatic Windows updates in Windows 11. This gives you the freedom to manually check for updates when it's convenient for you. In this article, we'll discuss five different methods for blocking automatic updates on your Windows 11 PC. By following these steps, you can take control of your system's updates and ensure that they don't interfere with your work.

Disable Windows 11 Updates Temporarily via Windows Update Settings

The easiest way to stop Windows 11 updates is to pause updates in Windows Update settings.

First, open Settings by clicking the ‘Start’ menu and selecting the ‘Settings’ option or with the shortcut Windows+I.

In the Settings app, click on the ‘Windows Update’ on the left pane. On the Windows Update settings page, you will an option to pause updates under ‘More options’.

To pause the Windows updates, click on ‘Pause for 1 week’ to keep the updates from showing for 7 days.

This will pause or stop updates temporarily for 7 days. If you want to pause updates for 7 more days, click ‘Extent for 1 week’. By keep pressing this button, you can pause the updates from being installed on this device for up to 35 days. After that, you will need to get new updates before you can pause again.

You can also change the pause period from ‘1 week’ to ‘5 weeks’ with the drop-down by clicking the down arrow next to the ‘Pause for 1 week’ or ‘Extend for 1 week’.

You can also resume the update whenever you prefer to do. Simply click the ‘Resume updates’ button at the top to resume the updates at any time.

This method will temporarily block all Windows 11 updates including security patches, cumulative updates, feature updates, etc. on your PC. But if you want a permanent solution, use one of the following methods.

Set a Metered Connection to Stop Windows Updates

By setting up the metered connection, you can prevent Windows 11 from automatically getting updated. Metered Connection allows you to limit the amount of data your system is allowed to use over Wi-Fi. This is really helpful when you’re running out of data and want to preserve it. Enabling the metered connection will restrict automatic updates on your Windows 11 PC.

To enable metered connection, open Windows 11 Settings by pressing Windows+I key. In the settings, click on the ‘Network & internet’ tile in the left panel and select the ‘Wi-Fi’ option on the right.

Next, click on your Wi-fi connection properties.

Then, slide the ‘Metered Connection’ toggle switch to the right to enable metered connection for that network.

After that, click on ‘Windows Update’ in the Settings.

In the Windows Update page, select ‘Advanced options’

Then make sure to ‘Download over metered Connections’ option is disabled.

Now, automatic updates will be turned off on your PC. If any updates become available to your device, they will be listed on your Windows Update page as ‘pending download’, waiting for you manually download them (as shown below). When you are ready to download and install the update, click ‘Download now’.

However, Windows 11 will continue to download and install important security updates on your computer automatically.

Stop Windows 11 Updates via Windows Update Service

If you want to block all Windows 11 updates permanently, turning off the entire Windows update service is one way to go about it. Here’s what you need to do:

First, click on the Start button on the taskbar and type ‘Services’ in the search bar. Then select the ‘Services’ app from the search result.

Alternatively, you can press Windows+R, type services.msc in the Run utility, and hit Enter to open the Windows Services.

In the Services window, scroll down the list of services and locate ‘Windows Update’. Once you found it double-click on it.

This will open the Windows update properties dialog box. Here, click the ‘Stop’ button under Services status to stop the service.

Then, choose ‘Disabled’ from the Startup type drop-down and click the ‘Apply’ button.

Now, all Windows 11 updates will be stopped completely including the manual updates. If you want to re-enable the Windows Update, choose ‘Automatic’ or ‘Manual’ and then click ‘Apply’.

Turn off Windows 11 Updates using Registry Editor

Another way to permanently disable updates in Windows 11 PC is through the Registry editor.

To disable updates, open the Run utility by pressing Win+R and typing regedit, and hitting Enter to open Registry Editor.

Then, navigate to the following location either using the left navigation pane or copying the below path to the address bar of the Registry editor:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows

Now, find the ‘WindowsUpdate’ key (folder) under the Windows folder in the left pane. If you don’t find it you need to create one by right-clicking the ‘Windows’ key and selecting ‘New’ > ‘Key’.

Then, rename the newly created key to WindowsUpdate.

Now, you need to create another key under the WindowsUpdate key. To do that, right-click on the ‘Windows Update’ key or the right pane and select ‘New’ > ‘Key’ to create a new key.

Then, rename that key as AU.

After that, right-click on the ‘AU’ key, and select ‘New’ > ‘DWORD (32-bit) Value’ to create a DWORD.

Then, name that entry as NoAutoUpdate.

After that, double-click on the new ‘NoAutoUpdate’ and change the value from 0 to 1.

Then, click ‘OK’ to save the changes and restart your PC to turn off automatic updates.

This will permanently stop the updates from automatically downloading and installing on your Windows 11 PC. However, when a new update becomes available, you’ll need to manually check for and download updates from the Windows Update Settings.

To re-enable automatic updates on Windows 11 again, delete the ‘NoAutoUpdate’ entry or the entire ‘WindowsUpdate’ key you created.

Customize Windows Update settings using Registry Editor

By default, Windows 11 will automatically download and install quality, features, and security updates. If you want to control and customize how updates are downloaded and installed on your Windows 11 system, follow these steps:

First, navigate to the below location in Registry Editor:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsUpdate\AU

If the WindowsUpdate and AU keys are not available in the registry editor, then you need to create them as we showed you above. Then, you need to create an ‘AUOptions’ entry instead of ‘NoAutoUpdate’ in the ‘AU’ folder. If you already have the ‘NoAutoUpdate’ registry entry, change its value to 0 or delete the entry entirely.

To create the ‘AUOptions’ Dword, right-click on the AU key or the right pane and select ‘New’ > ‘DWORD (32-bit) Value’.

Then, rename the DWORD as ‘AUOptions’. It stands for Auto-Update Options.

After that, double-click on the ‘AUOptions’ and change its value data to one of the below numbers:

• 2 — Notify to download and auto install.
• 3 – Auto download and notify to install.
• 4 – Auto download and schedule the install.
• 5 – Allow local admin to choose settings.
• 7 – Allow download, Notify to install, Notify to restart.

Enter the number in the Value data field of ‘AUOptions’ to apply the corresponding option. Then, click ‘OK’. In this example, we want Windows to notify us before downloading the updates and automatically install them after it’s downloaded. For that, we’re setting the value to ‘2’.

Disable Automatic Updates on Windows 11 using Group Policy Editor

You can also turn off automatic updates on Windows 11 using the local group policy editor. However, the Group Policy Editor will only work on Professional, Enterprise, and Education editions of Windows 11. To disable automatic updates, follow these steps:

Open the Run window and type gpedit.msc and hit Enter to open Local Group Policy Editor. Or you can search for ‘Edit Group Policy’ in the Windows search and open it.

Then navigate to the following location in the left navigation panel of the Local Group Policy Editor:

Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Windows Update > Manage end user experience

Now, head over to the right pane, and double-click upon ‘Configure Automatic Updates’.

Then, select the ‘Disabled’ radio button, click ‘Apply’, and then ‘OK’.

This will fully disable Windows 11 updates permanently on your computer.

Customizing Windows Update settings via Group Policy Editor

If you want to control and customize how updates are downloaded and installed on your Windows 11 system via group policy editor, follow these steps:

Open the above ‘Configure Automatic Updates’ dialog window and select ‘Enabled’.

Then, click on the ‘Configure automatic updating’ drop-down menu in the Options box and select any one of the below automatic update options:

• 2 – Notify for download and auto install. (recommended)
• 3 – Auto download and notify for install.
• 4 – Auto download and schedule the install.
• 5 – Allow local admin to choose settings.
• 7 – Allow download, Notify to install, Notify to restart.

Select the appropriate options, click ‘Apply’ and then ‘OK’. Here, we are selecting ‘3 –Auto download and notify for install‘ to automatically download the updates and notify us for installation.

Then, restart your computer to apply the changes. If you ever want to enable the Windows 11 automatic updates again, select the ‘Not configured’ and click ‘Apply’ in the Configure Automatic Updates window.

Uninstall Updates on Windows 11

As you update your computer with certain cumulative updates or newer builds, you may run into issues or bugs that were not present on previous builds. This can be frustrating, but there is a solution. If you encounter an update that causes problems or corrupts your operating system, it is better to uninstall it to fix the issues. Don't worry, it's not too difficult. Here are some simple steps you can follow to uninstall updates:

Open the settings app with Win + I and go to the ‘Windows Update’ section on the left.

Here, you can see the list of feature, quality, driver, and security updates you have recently installed on your device.

To uninstall updates, scroll down the Update history page and click ‘Uninstall updates’ under Related settings.

This will open up the ‘Installed Updates’ control panel. Here, select the update that causing the problem from the list and click the ‘Uninstall’ button to remove it.

Stop Windows 11 Auto-Updates with Third-Party Tools

If you are looking for an easy way to stop automatic Windows 11 updates, instead of going through the trouble of editing the Registry Editor or the Local Group Policy, you can try free 3rd-party tools.

There are a lot of third-party tools out there that can help you control, manage, and block automatic updates on your Windows 11 system easily. Here’s the list of some of the free update blocker tools:

• Windows Update Blocker
• Windows Updates Stop
• StopUpdates10
• WAU Manager
• Wu10Man
• Kill-Update

One of the simple and best tools among these is the Windows Update Blocker. You can download the latest version Windows Update blocker app from the official page. Go to the website, scroll down to the bottom of the page and click the ‘Download’ button to get the app.

After the file (Wub.zip) is downloaded, extract its contents and double-click on the  ‘Wub_x64’ to run it.

Once the Windows Update Blocker launches, select the ‘Disable Updates’, and click the ‘Apply Now’ button to disable all updates. And make sure the ‘Protect Services Settings’ option is checked.

Then, restart your system to apply the changes. To re-enable the Windows updates, launch the app, select the ‘Enable Updates’ option and click ‘Apply Now’.

Conclusion

Windows updates are important for the smooth functioning of your system. However, sometimes they can cause issues and interruptions in your workflow. In such cases, it may be necessary to stop automatic updates on your Windows 11 PC temporarily or permanently.

There are several ways to do this, including using Windows Update settings, setting up a metered connection, disabling the Windows Update Service, customizing update settings via Registry Editor or Group Policy Editor, uninstalling updates, or using third-party tools like Windows Update Blocker.

By following the above methods, you can take control of your Windows 11 updates and ensure that they don't interfere with your work.