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How to See Startup and Shutdown History in Windows

Windows 10 logs all system startups and shutdowns. If you ever need, follow these steps to see Windows startup and shutdown history.

If you are a system administrator or merely sharing your computer, you may sometimes need to know the computer’s startup and shutdown history. Though Windows does not display the history at the top of the screen, there are workarounds.

For example, we can utilize the Event Viewer to determine when the system started and shut down. If you’re curious, the Event Viewer records all system and some application events.

Because so many events occur when you start and stop a computer, all you have to do is pick a specific event and look at the timestamps to know about the Windows startup and shutdown history.

It may appear hard, but using Event Viewer to view the Windows startup and shutdown times is straightforward. Follow the steps below to view the startup and shutdown history in Windows 11 and 10.

The steps below work the same in Windows 10 and 11.

Table of contents:

Related: Shutdown Windows on schedule

Find Windows Startup History

  1. Press the Start key.
  2. Search and open “Event Viewer.”
  3. Go to “Windows Logs.”
  4. Go to the “System” folder.
  5. Click the “Filter current log” option.
  6. Type “6005” in the “Event Sources” field.
  7. (Optional) Select a time period from the “Logged” dropdown menu.
  8. Press “Ok.”
  9. All filtered events are startup events.
  10. Select an event and look at the “The event log service started” heading to see the startup time.

Steps with more details:

First, search for “Event Viewer” in the Start menu and open it.

open event viewer

In the Event Viewer application, go to the “Windows Logs” and “System” on the left panel. All system events are logged and listed in this section.

go to the system folder

On the right panel, you will see a whole bunch of events that occur on a daily basis. To filter out the system startup event, we can use filters. Click on the “Filter Current Log” option on the right panel.

select filter

In the next window, type “6005” in the “Event Sources” field and click on the “Ok” button. You can narrow the time period if you like. Choose a time period from the “Logged” dropdown menu. In my instance, I’m going with the defaults.

When you click the “Ok” button, the logs should be filtered so that you only see the startup events. Now, you will not specifically see the event named Startup. The events are named “The event log service was started.” Since the event service is automatically started when you start the system, it is the startup time.

see startup and shutdown history

Open the log, and you will see the Windows startup date and time.

As I previously stated, restricting the filtered results via the “Logged” option can be beneficial if you are looking for events in a specified range.

Related: How to cancel shutdown in Windows

Find Windows Shutdown History

Just like you can see the PC startup history, you can also see the PC shutdown history. Event Viewer automatically stops the Event service when you shut down the system. Since the event is logged with a different event ID, all we have to do is look for the event ID.

  1. Press the Start key.
  2. Search and open “Event Viewer.”
  3. Go to “Windows Logs.”
  4. Go to the “System” folder.
  5. Click the “Filter current log” option.
  6. Type “6006” in the “Event Sources” field.
  7. (Optional) Select a time period from the “Logged” dropdown menu.
  8. Press “Ok.”
  9. All filtered events are startup events.
  10. Select an event and look at the “The event log service started” heading to see the startup time.

Steps with more details:

Navigate to “Windows logs -> System” in the Event Viewer. Click the “Filter current log” option on the right side.

Type “6006” in the “Event Sources” field in the filter window and click the “Ok” button. Use the “Logged” drop-down menu to narrow the search to a certain time period.

That is all. It is that simple to find out the Windows startup and shutdown time.

I hope this simple and easy Windows how-to guide helped you.

If you are stuck or need some help, send an email, and I will try to help as much as possible.

Learn more about Event Viewer

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