12 Ways How You Can Make Windows 10 Faster

Windows 10 contains many features over previous versions, consequently increasing its demand for system resources. So, if you upgraded to this system on an older computer, it may not perform as fast as you want.

We highly recommend getting a solid-state drive (SSD) and using it as your system drive. No optimization techniques you perform on your system will come close to the performance enhancement an SSD provides. It’s also better to upgrade to a higher capacity RAM and other hardware devices.

If you can’t do so, apply the methods below to make Windows 10 faster. While some don’t provide significant boosts, every little bit counts, especially if you don’t have a higher-spec computer.

Table of Contents

Defragment Hard Drives

If your Hard Disk Drives (HDD) are fragmented, it significantly slows down your system. So, it’s best to defragment them regularly. You can also enable the setting to automate this process at certain intervals to avoid having to do so time and again manually.

Open Run.
Type dfrgui and press Enter to open Disk Defragmenter.
Select all your HDDs and click Optimize for each.
Then, click on Change settings or Turn on.
Check Run on schedule and Increase task priority.
Set the frequency as you wish and click on Choose next to Drives.
Enable your HDDs, disable SSDs and click OK.
Hit OK again.

Use High Performance Power Plan

Windows provides multiple power plans, such as High Performance, Balanced, and Power Saving, with preset functions that specify your power and performance options. By default, your system enables the Balanced power plan, but you can change it to High Performance to increase the system speed.

It also increases the processor’s clock cycle and heats it up at a faster rate, leading to a slight decrease in the CPU lifespan. So, we recommend enabling this power mode only when you need it or if you have a good cooling system.

Open Run.
Type powercfg.cpl and press Enter to open Power Options.
Click on Show additional plans and check High Performance.
You can also go to Change plan settings next to it and then Change advanced power settings to modify your power options individually.
After doing so, click OK.

If the High Performance power plan is not present there,

Open Run.
Type cmd and press Ctrl + Shift + Enter to open the Elevated Command Prompt.
Enter the command powercfg -duplicatescheme 8c5e7fda-e8bf-4a96-9a85-a6e23a8c635c
Then, check if the option shows up now.

You can also use the Ultimate Performance plan if you have a high-end PC.

Disable or Uninstall Unnecessary Apps

Many programs set themselves up to open at startup after you install them. Your system also sets some default apps as startup apps. So, even if you don’t open them, these apps are run on your system unless you manually close them, consuming your valuable system resources. You need to disable them to free these resources.

Open Run.
Type ms-settings:startupapps and press Enter to open Startup Settings.
Toggle off all unnecessary apps.
Then, press Ctrl + Shift + Esc to open the Task Manager.
Go to the Startup tab.
Select all unnecessary Enabled apps and click Disable.

You can also uninstall these apps if you don’t need them anymore. Plus, it’s better to take this time to remove all programs you don’t use from your system to free up space and avoid auto-running any unnecessary processes.

Open Run and enter appwiz.cpl to open Programs and Features.
Select any apps you don’t need and click Uninstall.|
Follow the on-screen instructions.
Then, open Run again.
Type appdata and press Enter to open the AppData folder.
Delete the user folders of the app you uninstalled from within all the folders inside AppData. You can search on the internet if you don’t know what the folder names are.

We also recommend you visit our dedicated article on How to Debloat Windows to learn how to remove other unnecessary programs you can’t uninstall with the above process.

Disable Third-party Services

Like startup apps, Windows also includes many services that run at startup or while launching certain processes. You can similarly check for such services and disable them if they are not necessary.

Open Run.
Type msconfig and press Enter to open System Configuration.
Go to the Services tab.
Check Hide all Microsoft services.
Disable all the services you feel are unnecessary. You can also search on the internet to know more about each service before doing so.
Click Apply and OK.

Enable Hardware-accelerated GPU Scheduling

Some computers support the Hardware Accelerated GPU Scheduling feature that assigns the GPU to perform all tasks that require video processes instead of the CPU. This way, the load on the CPU decreases, thereby improving its performance.

However, if you have a low-spec GPU, it will bottleneck other devices instead and cause your system to slow down even more. In such cases, you need to enable the option, check for such issues, and only keep it enabled if there’s no problem.

Open Run.
Type ms-settings:display-advancedgraphics and press Enter.
Enable Hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling if the option is available.

Disable Search Indexing

Windows uses the search indexing feature to create and update the index for your files/folders to provide faster search results.

However, if you have a slow CPU, indexing can use up much of your system resources. This makes your computer even slower, so it’s better to disable it in such a case.

Open Run.
Type services.msc and press Enter to open Windows Services.
Look for Windows Search and double-click on it to open its Properties.
Set the Startup type to Disabled and hit Stop.
Click Apply and OK.

Note: If you ever re-enable Search Indexing, your system will be even slower for some time while it is re-building the index.

Modify Virtual Memory Settings

Along with your RAM, your system allocates a certain portion of your system drive as virtual memory by creating a special file called pagefile. Windows automatically specifies where to create this file as well as its max/min size by default, but you can also change it manually.

If it creates the pagefile on an HDD volume, it will be slower than one created on an SSD partition. Also, if you don’t have an SSD, you will get the best result with the pagefile on your system drive.

Open Run.
Type systempropertiesadvanced and press Enter to open the Advanced tab of System Properties.
Under Performance, click on Settings and go to the Advanced tab.
Select Change under Virtual memory.
Uncheck Automatically manage paging file size for all drives.
Select an SSD partition or your system partition, and check System managed size.
For other partitions, check No paging file.
Keep clicking OK to exit the Properties while saving the changes, and restart your PC to apply them.

Enable USB ReadyBoost

If you don’t have an SSD, you can use the USB ReadyBoost feature to create swap space in a USB flash drive or SD card, which works as a cache between the RAM and your drives. They use flash memory technology which is faster than magnetic technology used by an HDD, so this feature provides a greater improvement to computer speed. However, if you use SSD, this barely affects your performance, so the option is disabled by default.

Insert a USB flash drive into your PC.
Open the File Explorer by pressing Win + E.
Navigate to This PC and right-click on the USB drive.
Click on Properties and go to the ReadyBoost tab.
If the options are available,
- Check Dedicate this device to ReadyBoost to allocate the whole USB to ReadyBoost.
- Check Use this device and set the slider to reserve only a portion for this feature.
Click OK.

Disable Visual Effects

Windows also includes some visual settings that enhance its appearance, like shadows on windows, thumbnails, and so on. However, these effects consume some of your system resources, so you can disable them if you don’t wish to trade performance for appearance.

Open Run.
Type systempropertiesadvanced and press Enter to open the Advanced tab of System Properties.
Under Performance, click on Settings.
On the Visual Effects tab, check Adjust for best performance.
You can also apply any effect you want to keep
Then, click Apply and OK.

Configure Storage Sense

Windows 10 also introduces a new feature, Storage Sense, as an alternative and improvement to the Disk Cleanup tool. With it, you can also easily schedule the cleanup process at certain intervals.

You can use it to routinely remove temporary and other unnecessary files, consequently freeing your disk space. If you don’t have enough free space, your system can’t create the pagefile to use as virtual memory, which slows down your computer.

Open Run.
Type ms-settings:storagepolicies to open Storage Sense Configuration.
Toggle on Storage Sense.
Set Run Storage Sense and other settings as you prefer.
You can also click Clean now to run Storage Sense manually if you want.

Update OS and Drivers

Microsoft regularly rolls out updates to provide new features and resolve previous bugs. So, you need to keep it fully updated to run Windows with the best possible performance.

The same is also true for your device drivers. So, we also recommend manually checking the drivers for updates if their corresponding devices don’t operate as quickly as they should.

To update your system,

Open Run.
Type ms-settings:windowsupdate and press Enter to open Update Settings.
Click on Check for updates, or Install now if any updates are available.

To manually update your drivers,

Open Run.
Type devmgmt.msc and press Enter to open the Device Manager.
Expand the categories and right-click on the devices.
Select Update Driver and then Search automatically for drivers.

Check System for Integrity Issues

Finally, it’s also better to check your system for integrity issues and fix them in order to have a smooth running system. You can use the Deployment Image Servicing and Management (DISM) and System File Checker (SFC) tools to do so. Even if there are no issues, this process doesn’t cause any harm, so you can safely perform it.

Open the Elevated Command Prompt
Enter the commands below:
- dism /online /cleanup-image /restorehealth
- sfc /scannow