If you're content with Windows 10 and not quite ready to make the leap to Windows 11, you're not alone. Many users prefer to stick with what's familiar, especially if their current setup meets all their needs. The good news is, there are several ways to prevent your PC from automatically updating to Windows 11, ensuring you can continue to enjoy Windows 10 without interruption. Here's a practical guide on how to do just that.

Why You Might Want to Stop Windows 11 Updates

  • System Requirements: Windows 11 demands higher system specs, which older PCs might not meet.
  • Stability Concerns: Being a newer OS, Windows 11 might still have some bugs and stability issues.
  • Preference for Windows 10: You might simply prefer the interface and features of Windows 10 over those in Windows 11.

Stop Windows 11 Upgrade From Windows Settings

The easiest way to block Windows 11 updates is to simply delay the download and installation of Windows 11 in Windows Update or stay away from Windows Update altogether.

Open Settings by clicking the ‘Start’ menu and selecting the ‘Settings’ option or using the shortcut Windows + I.

On the Settings app, click on the ‘Update & Security’ Tile.

On the Update and Security Settings page, select the ‘Windows Update’ option on the left panel. If a Windows 11 upgrade is ready for you, you’ll see an ‘Upgrade to Windows 11 is ready’ message (upgrade invitation). Below the message, you will also see an option to download and install the update as well as an option to ignore it. Sometimes this won’t appear unless you manually check for updates by clicking the ‘Check for updates’ button.

Now, simply click the ‘Stay on Windows 10 for now’ option to ignore the Windows 11 update.

This will keep the upgrade invitation from showing up again, at least for a few weeks. But this is only temporary. The upgrade option will appear again and prompt you to install it.

The Windows 11 upgrade is optional for Windows 10 systems for now, but it may become mandatory in the future. You can also pause updates to prevent Windows 11 updates. In the Windows update page, click on ‘Pause updates for 7 days’ to block updates for 7 days.

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

By doing this, the updates will be paused or stopped temporarily for 7 days. You can also change the period (here 7 days) to your desire by going through the advanced options in the Windows Update Window. You can also resume the update whenever you prefer to do.

You can also click the ‘Advanced options’ to change the pause period.

Then, change the pause period with the drop-down under the Pause updates section.

This method only temporarily blocks the Windows 11 update on your PC. But if you want a permanent solution, try any of the following methods.

Turn Off the Windows Update Service

If you want to block Windows 11 update permanently in Windows 10, turning off the entire Windows update service is one way to go about it. But keep in mind that disabling this service will also prevent your system from getting feature and security updates. Here’s how you do this:

First, click on the search 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.

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

Block Windows 11 Update using Registry Editor

The above method blocks all the updates to your Windows 10 PC including necessary updates like security and cumulative update patches for your operating systems and other programs. So if you want to block only the feature upgrade to Windows 11, you can use the new ‘TargetReleaseVersion’ policy or registry setting introduced by Microsoft.

With Windows 10 version 1803, Microsoft Microsoft has introduced a setting or policy called ‘TargetReleaseVersion’, which allows users to specify the target feature upgrade for Windows 10 you would like your computer to move to and/or stay with until that version reaches the end of service.

You can set the target feature upgrade version to the current or a newer version of Windows 10 to ensure that you stayed on a specific version of Windows 10. For instance, most of the current Windows 10 computers use version 21H1 or 20H2, so can set your target version of Windows 10 to 21H1 or 20H2 or the latest version Windows 10 21H2 (which started rolling out Nov 16, 2021). Let’s see how to do this:

Before we start, let’s check your Windows 10 version. To do that, open Settings, search for ‘About you PC’ in the search bar, and select the result.

Then scroll down to the ‘Windows specifications’ and check your Windows version. As you can see below, this system is on Windows 10 version 21H1.

Now, you can either lock down your Windows 10 PC to the current version or upgrade to a newer version of Windows 10 (But not Windows 11).

Now, follow these steps to set the target Windows 10 version to block Windows 11 upgrade:

Open up the Run window by pressing Win+R and typing regedit, and hit 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 key to WindowsUpdate.

Next, right-click on the ‘Windows Update’ key or on the right pane and select ‘New’ > ‘DWORD (32-bit) Value’ to create a new registry setting.

Then, rename the newly created Dword to TargetReleaseVersion and then double-click on it and set its value to 1. Then, click ‘OK’.

Now, create a new string by right-clicking the WindowsUpdate or on the right pane and selecting ‘New’ > ‘String’.

Next, rename the string to ProductVersion.

Then, set the value data of ‘ProductVersion’ to the Windows OS you want to stay on. In this case, Windows 10.

After that, create another string value by right-clicking on the right pane and selecting ‘New’ > ‘String’. Then, rename it to TargetReleaseVersionInfo and set its value to the desired version you want to upgrade to or stay with. For instance, this PC is currently on ‘Windows 10 Version 21H1’, so we are setting the value data to 21H1. You can see the list of Windows 10 versions that Microsoft still services with this link.

You can replace 21H1 with your current or a newer version of Windows 10. With Windows 10 21H2 (the latest version) is starting to roll out, you can also set the value data of ‘TargetReleaseVersionInfo’ to 21H2 to upgrade your system to the latest version of Windows 10.

If Microsoft releases a new version of the OS, you will have to update the value data to get the latest Windows 10 upgrades. Even if the latest version is not pushed to you yet, doing this will upgrade your PC to the latest feature update version of Windows 10.

You can now close Registry Editor and restart your computer to apply the changes.

Now, the Windows 11 update has been successfully blocked from being installed on your computer. Even if you check for updates in the Windows Update settings, Microsoft will not push Windows 11 upgrade to you. If you ever decide to upgrade to Windows 11, simply delete the above registries and try checking for updates.

Block Windows 11 Update using Group Policy Editor

Another way to block Windows 11 from being downloaded and installed on your Windows 10 PC is through Group Policy Editor. However, the Local Group Policy Editor tool is only available for Professional, Enterprise, and the Education editions of Windows 10 but not for the Home edition. If you want to block Windows 11 update on your Windows 10 Home edition, use above registry method. Here’s how you block Windows 11 upgrade using Group Policy Editor:

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:

Local Computer Policy > Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Windows Update > Windows Update for Business

Then, double-click on the ‘Select the target Feature Update version’ policy in the right of the Windows Update for Business folder to edit.

Now, set the policy to ‘Enabled’.

After it’s enabled, enter the below values to the Options:

  • Set ‘Which Windows product version would you like to receive feature updates for?’ – Windows 10.
  • Set ‘Target version of Feature updates’ – 21H1 or 21H2.

In the product version field, enter the OS version. We want to say on the Window 10 OS, so we entered Windows 10. For the ‘Target version of Feature updates‘ field, enter the value of the desired feature update version you want to upgrade to or stay with. You can set this option to 21H1 or 21H2 (latest version) or any other specific version. In this PC, we want to upgrade to Windows 10 version 21H2 (and not beyond that), so we entered 21H2.

Then, click ‘Apply’ to save the changes and then click ‘OK’ to close the dialog box. You can now close Local Group Policy Editor and restart your computer to apply the changes. This will force the Window to install feature updates for the specified version if it doesn’t already have it.

This will also prevent your system from installing any Windows version beyond the specified version (including Windows 11).

If you ever want to upgrade to Windows 11, select ‘Not configured’ or ‘Disabled’ for the above policy and click ‘Apply’. Then, restart your system and check for updates.

That’s it.