Is the Word application opening itself when you start your computer? Here’s how you can stop Word from opening on Startup in Windows 11 & 10.
Word is one of the most popular applications for creating and editing rich text documents. A few common reasons for this being its user friendliness, a ton of options, and a wide range of support for many different services, formats, and applications. If you use Word daily to create and edit documents, you might have noticed that sometimes, the Word application opens automatically on system startup.
While this is useful in some cases, it can also be a hindrance. For example, having yet another app to open at startup might increase your system startup time and also disturb your workflow.
Whatever you specific reason is, if you don’t want Word to opening on system startup, you can configure Windows 11 and Windows 10 to stop this behavior. In this quick and straightforward tutorial, let me guide you through the steps to stop Word from opening automatically on startup in Windows 11 and 10. Let’s get started.
Stop Word from Opening Automatically on Startup
On Windows 11:
- Use “Windows key + I” to open Settings.
- Go to the “Accounts” tab on the sidebar.
- Scroll down the right page and click the “Sign-in options” option.
- Turn OFF the “Automatically save my restartable apps and restart them when I sign back in” toggle.
- Restart your computer.
- With that, Word will not open automatically on startup in Windows 11.

On Windows 10:
- Open the Settings app by pressing “Windows key + I” shortcut.
- Click the “Accounts” option.
- Select “Sign-in options” on the sidebar.
- Turn OFF the “Restart apps” toggle.
- Close the Settings app.
- Restart your Windows 10 PC.
Detailed Steps (With Screenshots)
As with most things, the option we want is inside the Settings app. So, the first thing you should do is open it by pressing the “Windows key + I” shortcut. Alternatively, click the “Notification” icon on the taskbar and select the “All Settings” button.
After opening the Settings app, click the “Accounts” option and then select “Sign-in options” on the sidebar. On the right page, scroll down and turn OFF the “Restart Apps” toggle.

After disabling the Restart Apps functionality, close the Settings app by clicking the “X” icon on the title bar and then restart your computer. After restarting, the Word app will not open automatically when you turn on your system.
Why Does Word Start Automatically in Windows 11 & 10?
Both Windows 10 and Windows 11 has a built-in feature called “Restartable Apps”. When this feature turned ON, it try to open the all the programs that are open when you last shutdown your computer. For example, if your Word application is open and you shutdown your system without closing Word, the next time you start your PC, Windows tries to automatically open the Word application. This applies to all applications that support the “Restartable Apps” feature.
As you can guess, this feature is intended to help you quickly resume your work from where you left off without having to open the apps manually. Turning off this feature stops Windows from automatically launching previously opened apps automatically on startup. It has no affect of startup apps.
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That is all. It is that simple to stop Word from automatically opening at system startup. If you have any questions or need help, comment below. I’ll be happy to assist.