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How to Perform Clean Boot on Windows 10 & 11

Quick steps:

  1. Press Windows key + R, type msconfig, and click OK. Select Hide all Microsoft services, click Disable all, and Click OK.
  2. Right-click on the taskbar, select Task Manager, go to Startup apps, select each app in the list, and click Disable. Do this for all apps in the list.
  3. Restart your computer to enter the clean boot environment.

When you are facing problems with Windows, clean booting helps you troubleshoot and pinpoint the services and programs that might be causing the issue. In this tutorial, we’ll show you how to perform a clean boot on Windows 10 & 11.

What is Clean Boot?

In simple terms, Clean Boot is just starting Windows with only essential services and drivers. When clean booting, you will disable all third-party services and startup apps and then restart the computer. That means, there are fewer things to interfere with the Windows startup process. You can think of it as booting into Safe Mode, only it’s not overly restrictive.

After restarting, you can enable a few services and startup apps at a time, and then restart the computer. This gradual approach allows you to identify the specific service or startup app that is causing the problem.

Steps to Perform Clean Boot

The following steps will work in both Windows 10 & 11.

Start by opening the Run dialog box by pressing Windows key + R. Type msconfig in the dialog box and click OK. This will open the System Configuration window.

Open Run dialog, type msconfig, and click OK

Navigate to the Services tab in the System Configuration window, select the Hide all Microsoft services checkbox, and then click the Disable All button. Click OK to save changes

In the System Configuration window, go to the Services tab. Here, we first need to hide all the essential Windows services. So, select the Hide all Microsoft services checkbox.

tick hide all Microsoft services checkbox, click disable, and then click OK

Hit the Exit without restart button in the confirmation window.

Click Exit without Restart button

Next, we need to disable startup programs. For that, right-click on the Taskbar and select Task Manager.

Right-click on taskbar and select Task Manager

Navigate to the Startup apps tab (Startup in Windows 10), select each application, and click the Disable button. Once you do this, the Status of all apps in the Startup list should be Disabled.

Clean boot windows 10 step 06

Finally, close the Task Manager window and restart your computer. To start, right-click on the Windows icon on the taskbar and select Shut down and sign out > Restart to enter the clean boot environment.

You can now manually enable each service and startup item and restart the computer each time until you identify the application or service that is causing the problem. Once you identify the problem, you can either completely disable or remove that service or startup application to fix the issue.

Update: The tutorial is updated to make it easier and ensure it is compatible with both Windows 10 and 11.

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