How to Temporarily or Permanently Disable Your Keyboard

Newsroom Aug 28 2 min read

This archive report was first published on 28 August 2021.

Why Disable Your Keyboard? ¶

Disabling your keyboard can be a useful security precaution, especially if you have children or pets at home who may accidentally press keys while you're away.

Published on August 28, 2021.

Temporarily Disable Your Keyboard ¶

Using Device Manager, you can temporarily disable your keyboard for the current session. To do this:

Open Device Manager by right-clicking on the Start menu and selecting Device Manager.
Expand the Keyboards section and right-click on your PS/2 keyboard (built-in keyboard).
Uninstall Device by right-clicking on it.
When prompted, click Uninstall once more.
Alternatively, you can disable an external keyboard by right-clicking on it in the Keyboards section and selecting Uninstall Device.

Permanently Disable Your Keyboard ¶

There are several ways to permanently disable your keyboard, including:

Using Group Policy Editor ¶

To prevent Windows from installing keyboard drivers after a reboot, you can use the Group Policy Editor to enable a device installation restriction. To do this:

Open Device Manager and expand the Keyboards section.
Right-click on your keyboard and select Properties.
Navigate to the Details tab and select Hardware Ids from the drop-down menu under 'Property.'
Copy the first hardware value and paste it into the 'Show Contents' window in the Group Policy Editor.
Enable the device installation restriction policy and click OK.
Return to Device Manager and uninstall your keyboard.

Using System Properties ¶

Alternatively, you can disable automatic keyboard updates using System Properties. To do this:

Open the RUN dialog box by pressing Win + R and type sysdm.cpl.
Navigate to the Hardware tab and select Device Installation Settings from the drop-down menu.
Choose No and press the Save Changes button.
When you restart your computer, your keyboard will remain disabled.