How to disable Windows key or WinKey in Windows 11

Pressing the Windows keys opens the start menu. Using combinations of WinKey with other keys on your keyboard lets you perform many actions and commands that you perform with the mouse. These are the WinKey or Windows Key shortcuts, and they are very useful. However, if you want to disable the Windows key hotkeys in Windows 11/10, here is how you can do that.

When gaming and pressing the Windows Key, any open PC game with the taskbar hidden will minimize without exiting the program. This often becomes a nightmare for PC gamers, and as such, while playing PC games, most prefer to disable this key.

Let us see how we can disable the Windows key on the keyboard to improve the Gaming experience.

Disable Windows key or WinKey in Windows 11/10

There are five ways to disable the WinKey or Windows Key:

1. Use WinKey Killer or WinKill
2. Edit the Registry manually
3. Use the Group Policy Editor
4. Use the Registry.
5. Use RemapKeyboard PowerToy.

1] Use WinKey Killer or WinKill

Download and use WinKey Killer, a freeware app. However, this does not appear to work on later Windows versions.

I have, however, tried WinKill on my Windows 11/10 and it worked.

WinKill sits in the system tray where you can toggle On or Off the killing of the Windows Key. You can download it here.

2] Edit the Registry manually

To completely disable the Windows key, follow these steps:

• Open regedit.
• On the Windows menu, click HKEY_LOCAL_ MACHINE on Local Machine.
• Double-click the System\CurrentControlSet\Control folder, and then click the Keyboard Layout folder.
• On the Edit menu, click Add Value, type in Scancode Map, click REG_BINARY as the Data Type, and then click OK.
• Type 00000000000000000300000000005BE000005CE000000000 in the Data field, and then click OK.
• Close Registry Editor and restart the computer.

To enable the Windows key, follow these steps:

• Open regedit.
• On the Windows menu, click HKEY_LOCAL_ MACHINE on Local Machine.
• Double-click the System\CurrentControlSet\Control folder, and then click the Keyboard Layout folder.
• Right-click the Scancode Map registry entry, and then click Delete. Click Yes.
• Close Registry Editor and restart the computer.

You may want to back up your registry first.

3] Using the Group Policy Editor

To disable Windows Key hotkeys in Windows 11/10 using Group Policy, follow these steps:

Run gpedit.msc and navigate to the following setting:

User Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > File Explorer

In the right pane, you will see Turn off Windows Key hotkeys. Double-click on it and select Enabled.

Keyboards with a Windows key provide users with shortcuts to common shell features. For example, pressing the keyboard sequence Windows+R opens the Run dialog box; pressing Windows+E starts File Explorer. By using this setting, you can disable these Windows+X shortcut keys. If you enable this setting, the Windows+X shortcut keys are unavailable. If you disable or do not configure this setting, the Windows+X shortcut keys are available.

Click the OK button. This should do the job!

4] Using Registry Editor

If your Windows, does not have the Group Policy Editor, you can use the Registry Editor to turn off the Windows key.

Navigate to –

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer

Create a 32-bit DWORD value, name it NoWinKeys and give it a value of 1.

5] Using Remap Keyboard PowerToy

1. Download and install Microsoft PowerToys.
2. Launch PowerToys
3. Go to Keyboard Manager
4. Select Remap a key
5. Click the ‘+’ button
6. Under Key click on the Type Key button
7. Press your Winkey and click OK.
8. Under Mapped To, select Undefined from the drop-down.

That’s it!

How do I turn off Windows hotkeys?

To turn off Windows hotkeys in Windows 11/10, you can use the Registry Editor, Group Policy Editor, or WinKey Killer tool. In the Group Policy Editor, you must enable the “Turn off Windows Key hotkeys” setting. In the Registry Editor, you need to set the Value data of NoWinKeys as 1.

Check this post if your WinKey or Windows key has become disabled, and this one if you’d like to only disable Win+L Shortcut Key.