I’ve two computer systems in my home that, very similar to disgruntled toddlers, will not keep asleep. I click on the Sleep button, await all of the followers to cease spinning, and discover myself woken up by the blinding lights of my motherboard at 2 a.m. If this appears like a well-recognized story, listed here are a number of methods to diagnose the issue and preserve your pc down for the evening.

Discover Out What Woke Your Laptop

Home windows is aware of what wakened your pc most just lately, so the following time it wakes up unexpectedly, open the Begin menu and search “cmd,” then right-click the Command Immediate and select Run As Administrator. Kind the next command and press Enter:

powercfg -lastwake

If you happen to’re fortunate, it’ll offer you a transparent reply. For instance, the final time my workstation wakened, it was attributable to my cloud backup program working its scheduled backup for the night. In that case, your search is over, and you’ll modify that program’s settings or uninstall it to cease the issue. 

In different circumstances, it might record a particular {hardware} system, and you’ll skip right down to the related part on this article, or do net seek for what settings to alter on that system. If that command didn’t offer you helpful info, do that one:

powercfg -waketimers

I’ve additionally had luck looking out Home windows’ Occasion Viewer for info. Click on the Begin menu, seek for “Occasion Viewer,” and launch the device. Within the sidebar, head to Home windows Logs > System, then click on Filter Present Log on the correct facet of the window. In Home windows 11, it is known as Create Customized View.

Select Energy-Troubleshooter from the Occasion Sources drop-down menu and click on OK to see all of the instances your pc wakened just lately and what induced them. Filtering by Kernel-Energy might assist too, however in my expertise, it’s much less prone to embrace helpful knowledge.

Utilizing that info, you’ll be able to attempt a few of the options beneath to maintain your pc from waking up randomly subsequent time.

Tweak Home windows Replace, Scheduled Upkeep

Home windows Replace is a fickle beast, and I’ve had it trigger quite a few undesirable wakeups up to now. There are a number of methods to resolve this downside. First, attempt utilizing Home windows Replace’s built-in instruments to extra meticulously schedule these updates and reboots.

Set your Lively Hours and defer updates till you’ve time to put in them, and also you might be able to clear up this downside simply. In Home windows 10, head to Settings > Replace & Safety > Home windows Replace to pause updates or change energetic hours. Home windows 11 customers can open Settings > Home windows Replace to pause updates. To alter energetic hours, click on Superior choices > Lively hours.

A few of these choices could also be unavailable to you should you obtained your pc via work.

Dig Deeper With Native Group Coverage Editor

If you must dig somewhat deeper in to your settings, you will have a Professional or Enterprise model of Home windows 10 or 11 so as to entry the Group Coverage Editor. So long as you’ve one thing aside from the House version, you’ll be able to open the Begin menu and seek for “Group Coverage.”

With Native Group Coverage Editor open, head to Laptop Configuration > Administrative Templates > Home windows Parts > Home windows Replace, then double-click Enabling Home windows Replace Energy Administration and set it to Disabled.

Home windows additionally runs an Automated Upkeep set of duties as soon as per day, which it says contains software program updates, safety scans, and different jobs. Open the Begin menu, seek for “Automated upkeep,” and open the ensuing possibility inside the Management Panel.

You possibly can both change the time this runs—I’ve mine set to run at 5 p.m.—or forestall this from waking the pc altogether by unchecking the field on the backside.

Discover a Misbehaving USB Gadget

Home windows might let you know a USB system is waking your pc, however you’ll have to seek out the offending system. I’d guess {dollars} to donuts it is your mouse or keyboard—perhaps your cat thinks it is a enjoyable toy whenever you aren’t wanting—but it surely may very well be something.

You probably have hassle determining which system is the issue, take away all of your USB units the following time you place your pc to sleep, and see if it wakes up by itself. If it doesn’t, depart one system plugged within the subsequent time you place it to sleep. Maintain doing this till you discover the offending system.

As soon as you discover the problematic {hardware}, open the Begin menu and seek for “Gadget Supervisor.” Discover the system within the ensuing record—say, your keyboard—and right-click on it. Choose Properties and the Energy Administration tab, then uncheck the Enable This Gadget to Wake the Laptop possibility and click on OK. 

In case your pc does not keep asleep after this, you may additionally attempt getting into the BIOS and disabling USB waking from there, should you see an possibility for it. (Enter the BIOS setup by urgent a key when your pc first boots, often one thing like Delete or F2—the boot display will let you know.)

Restrict Your Community Adapter

Considered one of my insomniac computer systems advised me that it was waking up due to an Intel(R) I211 Gigabit Community Connection. That’s the Ethernet port that connects my pc to the web, and it means some type of community exercise is waking the pc up repeatedly. You possibly can repair this from the Gadget Supervisor.

Open the Begin menu, seek for “Gadget Supervisor,” and discover the Ethernet or Wi-Fi adapter in query beneath Community Adapters. Proper-click on it, select Properties, and open the Energy Administration tab. Uncheck the Enable This Gadget to Wake the Laptop possibility, and you ought to be golden. You might also discover community wakeup choices within the BIOS, as described above.

Alternatively, you’ll be able to preserve that field checked, and choose Solely Enable a Magic Packet to Wake the Laptop. That is helpful should you use Wake-On-LAN to entry sleeping computer systems remotely. It’ll be sure that Wake-On-LAN nonetheless works, with out permitting simply any community visitors to evoke your pc from its slumber. This field isn’t checked by default, for some ungodly purpose, and checking it solved my downside superbly.

Disable Different Wake Timers

If not one of the above repair your concern, you could have to dig in to the wake timers set in your pc—that’s, scheduled occasions which are allowed to wake your machine. Open the Begin menu, seek for “Edit Energy Plan,” and click on Change Superior Settings within the Edit Plan Settings window.

Head to Sleep > Enable Wake Timers and alter each Battery and Plugged In to Disabled. You’ll need to repeat this course of for all of your energy plans within the drop-down menu on the high, not simply the one you’re presently utilizing.

Right here’s the factor, although: This can be a sweeping setting designed to have an effect on all wake timers, which can imply it’s too overzealous for you (you probably have sure wake timers you need turned on). It’s additionally weirdly ineffective, which implies even should you do need to go nuclear on wake timers, it might not cease all of them, however be at liberty to regulate it anyway.

With that in thoughts, I additionally suggest opening PowerShell. Do that by right-clicking the Begin menu and choosing Home windows PowerShell (Home windows 10) or Home windows Terminal (Home windows 11). You possibly can then run the next command:

Get-ScheduledTask | the place {$_.settings.waketorun}

This may occasionally aid you discover scheduled duties designed to get up your PC. If you happen to discover any you need turned off, open the Begin menu and seek for “Activity Scheduler,” then navigate to the duty in query utilizing the sidebar, and double-click to edit it. Choose the Circumstances tab and uncheck the Wake the Laptop to Run This Activity field.

Random wakeups could be extremely finicky to resolve, and you might discover that much more digging is required to seek out your particular concern. However hopefully the above choices have no less than pointed you in the correct path.

Needless to say you could have to return and do that in a number of months if it begins occurring once more—new applications, new {hardware}, and Home windows updates can at all times trigger the issue to resurface. It’s a curse, however no less than now you’ll be able to preserve it beneath management.