by There are several ways – choose the one that suits you.
Microsoft integrated antivirus into its operating system for a reason: this tool protects the system from malicious programs from the moment it is first launched. Therefore, Windows Defender, also called “Windows Defender” or “Windows Security”, is a useful feature that most users need.
However, sometimes this antivirus has to be disabled. For example, from time to time Windows Defender prevents you from opening the programs you need, and in Windows 11 it also constantly loads the processor by searching for threats in real time. In the end, if you prefer a third-party antivirus, then protection from Microsoft may conflict with it.
Usually, the built-in antivirus is disabled after installing a new one, but sometimes this does not happen and the protections begin to interfere with each other – they slow down the system or see each other as unwanted software. Here's what you can do about it.
How to temporarily disable Windows Defender in different OS versions
If you need to run some program, and Windows Defender mistakenly considers it to be malicious, you can turn it off right in the settings. This option is suitable for Windows 10 and 11. It is the easiest, but only temporarily disables protection.
1. Open the Start menu, click Settings, and navigate to Privacy & Security → Windows Security → Virus & Threat Protection → Virus & Threat Protection Settings → Manage settings”.
2. Disable “Real-time protection”.
For some time, the antivirus will stop responding to your actions, even if you are working with files that it considers potentially malicious. But, as it says in the warning next to the Real-time Protection option, then Windows Defender will turn on automatically.
How to permanently disable Windows Defender in Windows 10
Through the registry
1. Click Settings → Windows Security → Virus & threat protection → Virus & threat protection settings → Manage settings. Turn off the “Anti-Forgery” option. jpg” alt=”How to disable Windows Defender” />
2. Launch the Windows Registry Editor. To do this, press the Win + R keys, type regedit in the Run window and press Enter.
3. In the left pane of the registry window, navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE → SOFTWARE → Policies → Microsoft → Windows Defender.
4. Right-click on an empty area of the window, select “New” → “DWORD (32 bit) Value” and name it DisableAntiSpyware. Double-click it and set its value to 1.
5. Create the AllowFastServiceStartup and ServiceKeepAlive parameters in the same way. Set it to 0.
6. Right-click the Windows Defender partition in the left pane, select New → Partition, and create the Real‑Time Protection subkey. Or open it if it's already there. In it, create the DisableIOAVProtection and DisableRealtimeMonitoring parameters. Set them to 1.
7. Then, in the same Windows Defender partition, create a Spynet subkey. In it, create the settings DisableBlockAtFirstSeen with value 1, LocalSettingOverrideSpynetReporting with value 0 and SubmitSamplesConsent with value 2.
8. Now, in the left pane in the registry window, navigate to the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE → SYSTEM → CurrentControlSet → Services → WinDefend directory. Find the Start setting and set it to 4. Note that this may not work on all versions of Windows, but it's worth a try.
9. Reboot and check Windows Security. If you did everything correctly, the antivirus will display the following message.
10. Finally, right-click on the Start menu and open Task Manager. In it, select “More Info”, go to the “Startup” tab, find the Windows Defender Notification icon option, right-click it and click “Disable”. Restart your computer.
Using an application
If you find the algorithm described too complicated, try the free Dism++ program. It is used to fine-tune the system and can disable Windows Defender, among other things.
1. Click Settings → Windows Security → Virus & threat protection → Virus & threat protection settings → Manage settings. Turn off the Anti-counterfeiting option.
2. Download the archive with the utility and unzip its contents, then run the version of the program that suits you (for a more or less modern computer, this is Dism++x64.exe).
3. In the window that appears, open “Optimization” → “Security settings” and activate the “Turn off Windows Defender” option.
4. Restart your computer.
Dism++ →
How to permanently disable Windows Defender in Windows 11
Via file sharing settings
In Windows 11, Microsoft changed how the built-in antivirus works, and methods that were suitable for version 10 no longer work. Enthusiasts have found several others. The most reliable and trouble-free is to restrict the OS access to Windows Defender files, and then it simply will not be able to start it.
1. Go to the Start menu → Power and hold down the Shift key and press Restart.
2. The computer will restart and you will see a blue screen with a text interface. Go to Troubleshooting → Advanced Options → Upload Options → Reload.
3. On the next screen, press F4 on your keyboard to boot into safe mode.
4. After restarting, open File Explorer, paste the path C:programdataMicrosoftWindows Defender into the address bar and press Enter to navigate. Right-click the Platform folder and click Properties.
5. Go to the “Security” tab and click “Advanced”.
6. Click “Edit” next to “Owner”. .jpg” alt=”How to disable Windows Defender” />
7. Click “Advanced” in the pop-up window.
8. Click on the “Search” button and then double click on “Administrators”.
9. Click OK in the selection window.
10. Check the box next to “Replace all child permission entries” and remove the “SYSTEM” and “Trustedinstaller” entities one by one.
11. Confirm the action and close this window.
12. Now just restart your computer to start Windows normally.
Using the application
If the previous method is too complicated for you or something doesn’t work, there is an easier option – a special Defender Control utility. Its only function is to disable and enable Windows Defender in one click. Like all system tweaks, it causes antiviruses to panic, so you will have to temporarily disable it or add the program to the exceptions.
Defender Control is distributed through the official website, where there are Virustotal reports and MD5 hashes for verification, so no reason to doubt the decency of this software.
1. Download the utility from the link below using the gray Download button at the very end of the page.
2. Unpack the downloaded archive by entering the password sordum.
3. Go to “Settings” → “Privacy and Security” → “Windows Security” → “Virus and threat protection” and in the “Virus and threat protection settings” click “Manage settings”.< /p>
4. Under Exceptions, click Add or Remove Exceptions.
5. Click “Add exception” → “Folder” and specify the path to the directory with the Defender Control.
6. Open this folder.
7. Run the dfControl file as administrator.
8. When the utility starts, click Disable Windows Defender.
After a few seconds, Windows Defender will be disabled and the window will change from green to red to confirm. If you need to reactivate Microsoft Antivirus in the future, just click the Enable Windows Defender button.
The text of the article was updated in February 2022.
