Conversely, disabling unnecessary apps from running in your background would help you preserve the extensively utilized resources and get better performance. So, this article is bundled with some of the methods and their detailed steps to disable background apps on Windows.
Ways to Disable Background Apps on Windows
The methods listed below will begin with simple app settings which let you disable background permissions for individual apps and will also sum up some registry and group policy edits to mass disable background apps:
From App Settings
Windows lets its users modify the background app permission from the Application Settings. But, not all applications can be configured through this because some won’t allow editing that permission. Moreover, unlike previous versions of Windows, you cannot disable all the background apps at once in Windows 11. You can still disable the background apps one at a time from Settings using these steps: As already mentioned, you can disable the background apps in Windows 10 all at once using the Privacy settings. The steps to do so would include the following:
From Power Settings
Disabling Background applications is an effective way to reduce battery usage and increase battery life. So, for laptop users, the power usage setting also helps access the same background app permissions. If it’s useful for you, follow the steps mentioned below:
By Editing Registry
Instead of changing background app permissions of applications one by one, you can disable all the background apps by adding and changing one key in the registry editor. But, before you jump to the upcoming steps in doing so, make sure to back up the registry because unintended changes can result in the instability of the system.
Using Command Prompt
As convenient as it is to edit the registry to disable background apps, there’s an easier way to do so using the command lines. The steps below will help to modify the registry as above, but rather than opening the registry editor, you can copy-paste the mentioned command:
With Group Policy Editor
For the Windows Pro Edition user, Group Policy Editor is packed with the functionality to disable background apps all at once. This method is comparatively simple than modifying registry values. The steps to do so have been mentioned below: The Group Policy editor is unavailable in the Home edition of Windows by default. However, you can enable the group policy on the Home edition by running the following script in admin-privileged Command Prompt:
FOR %F IN ("%SystemRoot%\servicing\Packages\Microsoft-Windows-GroupPolicy-ClientTools-Package~.mum") DO (DISM /Online /NoRestart /Add-Package:"%F") FOR %F IN ("%SystemRoot%\servicing\Packages\Microsoft-Windows-GroupPolicy-ClientExtensions-Package~.mum") DO (DISM /Online /NoRestart /Add-Package:"%F")
