On Windows 10, one of the most annoying features is the system's ability to restart your computer to apply updates automatically when you're actively using it, which could cause the loss of unsaved work and precious time when working on a deadline.
Although there's not an option in the Settings app to disable updates entirely, Windows 10 ships with "active hours," which is a feature meant to make updates less intrusive by letting you specify the time you'll be working on your computer. This means that if an update is pending, the reboot will occur outside the active hours.
How To Change Active Hours For Windows Updates In Windows 10
Starting with Windows 10 version 1903, there are two ways to enable active hours. You can allow the system to configure active hours automatically based on your activities, or you can set a specific time range manually.
Once you complete these steps, Windows 10 will analyze how you use the device, and it'll configure the active hours automatically. Also, this means that as your screen time schedule changes, the active hours will adjust accordingly.
On the next screen, you can turn on the switch to allow Windows to automatically adjust the hours based on your activity (more on that below). By default, it is set from 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM. But you can change the time frame. If you will be busy using your PC during certain times of the day, you can let Windows know, and prevent your device from automatically restarting. Just click the Change link.
To finish installing an update, your computer will need to restart sometimes. Active hours let Windows know when you are typically at your computer, and then use that information to schedule updates to make sure it will restart when you are not using the computer.
If you want to stop your computer from restarting automatically at a bad time, you should turn to the Active Hours feature. Configuring the active hours properly is a good way to manage the device restarts especially after system updates. MiniTool Solution now tells you how to turn off the auto-restart on Windows 10 during active hours.
Windows 10 disable automatic restart or delay automatic reboot is very important to prevent the loss of unsaved data. The following content shows you how to turn off auto restart Windows 10 for updates during the active hours in different ways.
The latest editions of Windows 10 let you set active hours, which are the times you're regularly using your computer. During this period, Windows Update won't restart your device to install updates. The option is available under Settings > Windows Update > Change active hours.
Active hours tells your computer when not to attempt installing updates. This does not necessarily mean updates will never install during these hours, however it will attempt to delay the updates during the selected hours.
Microsoft releases new significant updates roughly every six months, known as Semi-Annual or Feature Updates. These updates typically become available during Spring and Fall and include new features, visual improvements, experience changes, and security enhancements. These updates can be sizeable and require more testing than the smaller Quality Updates, which follow a weekly or sometimes daily release cadence.
Devices attempt to restart outside of active hours unless/until a user specifies an alternate date/time. If the device could not restart within the auto-restart deadline, the device will force a restart, which may occur during active hours. The user receives at least two notifications informing them of the pending reboot.
Unless you have changed the default settings of Windows Update, Windows 10 automatically downloads and installs available updates. After installing the update(s), Windows 10 might need to reboot your PC to complete installing the update(s).
Lastly, you can navigate to Settings > Update & security > Windows Update to check if there is a scheduled restart outside of active hours. And if you want to install an update during active hours, click the Restart now button.
Step 3: Here, turn off the Automatically adjust active hours for this device based on activity option so that you can manually set the active hours. Click the Change link.
Since deploying the Win10 machines I've found they do not require the user to restart the machine the way Win7 does, as I understand it's due to Win10's active hours setting which defaults to 8am-8pm. This causes us to have to reach out to each individual staff member in the days following the push and remind them to restart their laptop in order to complete installation of updates.
Is there a way to override the active hours setting via GPO or some other way? Our DCs are running Server 2008 R2. I've combed through all of the Windows settings in the WSUS GPO but can't find a way to require the Win10 machines to restart similar to the Win7 machines.
Alternatively, you may want to adjust or change the active hours in Windows instead of preventing the computer to automatically restart. To adjust the active hours in Windows, you can do this from Update & Security > Windows Update , then select Change active hours. By default, Windows 10 will adjust the active hours automatically based on your activity. However, you may opt to use a different set of active hours to perform these automatic updates in some situations.
Keeping Microsoft windows devices up-to-date has been a challenge I have been dealing with for a long time now. Within Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager/ConfigMgr getting grips on your updates was and is not an easy experience which you configure once and never have to touch again.
Since the introduction of Windows 10, Microsoft has been struggling with how to make the Windows Update experience fit with the requirements from its customers. This makes finding the right and most current information troublesome and confusing. Microsoft changed the way they named functionality along the way and they also modified how updates are delivered, by optimizing the necessary download sizes and reducing the amount of software updates. Today we are talking about quality updates which are released on a monthly basis and contain fixes and security updates and we have feature updates which are released twice a year updating Windows 10 to a new version. We used to have Servicing Stack Updates (updates to the Windows Update mechanism itself), which caused some issues because quality updates were depending on them, but now these servicing stack updates have been integrated in the quality updates installation as well, removing this dependency on each other. At time of writing Windows 10 feature update 21H1 is around the corner.
I use the same mechanism for rolling out other changes in the organization as well, for example when rolling out Microsoft 365 Apps updates, new Configuration Profiles or Compliance policies, new Conditional Access policies, application updates and any other update which might affect the end users of the device.
By setting the actions of the Power and Sleep button to not configured, users can change these settings themselves. You want to create a situation where devices go into sleep mode first, which gives the system more time to install any software updates if needed. By enabling Hybrid sleep you create a combination of sleep and hibernation where if the machine loses power, its state is written on the hard disk as well, preventing users from losing information.
Added in Windows 10, version 1703. Allows the IT Admin to specify the deadline in days before automatically scheduling and executing a pending restart outside of active hours. The deadline can be set between 2 and 30 days from the time the restart becomes pending. If configured, the pending restart will transition from Auto-restart to Engaged restart (pending user schedule) to be automatically executed within the specified period. If no deadline is specified or the deadline is set to 0, the restart will not be automatically executed and will remain an Engaged restart (pending user scheduling). Please note that this field is configurable only if an Automatic restart on pending restart (engaged) is checked.
Added in Windows 10, version 1703. Allows the IT Admin to control the timing before transitioning from Auto restarts scheduled outside of active hours to Engaged restart, which requires the user to schedule. The period can be set between 2 and 30 days from the time the restart becomes pending. Supported values are 2-30 days. The default value is 7 days.
Windows Home Edition may not carry as many features as Windows Pro, but still provides ample options to blocking, postponing, and pausing system updates. Windows Home Edition allows you to block updates during specific hours, restrict updates to limited bandwidth, and permanently stop Windows updates.
In the most recent version of Windows 10, Windows Updates can be blocked during active computer usage. This solution is helpful for frustrating system updates that interrupt your daily workflows. Here is how to set your updates to specific hours:
Windows 10 pushes a lot of regular updates, with some improvement in stability and performance, and critical updates as well, mainly about bug fixes and shiny new features. Windows 10 update is quite normal and frequent, like twice each month. That's the point! You seem to reach the frustrating moment again, where Windows 10 updates are taking hours and hours downloading and installing itself correctly on your PC. How long does windows update take? How are you going to skip such long waiting?
A faster internet connection may solve your problem and decrease the update speed. You can change to another faster connection by upgrading to a fiber-optic connection or purchasing more bandwidth from your internet service provider. You can also try a brandwidth management tool to ensure sufficient network resources are reserved for Windows 10 updates. 2ff7e9595c
Comments