How to turn off a laptop keyboard

Want to disable your laptop's keyboard? Here's how to do it both temporarily and permanently

Turning off your laptop keyboard is perhaps a little harder than it should be, but with good reason. It’s certainly not the sort of thing you’d like to do by accident. We’re going to show you how you can permanently disable your your laptop keyboard.

How to temporarily disable laptop keyboard

1. Head into your Start Menu, and type in Device Manager
2. Open up the Device Manager and find your way to Keyboards and hit the arrow to the left of it
   
   
   
   
3. Here you will be able to find your laptop’s keyboard. Right click on it and hit 'Uninstall'
   

The keyboard will now be temporarily disable work until you have to restart your laptop, but when you turn it back on the machine will automatically reinstall the drivers for your keyboard. If you’d like to permanently disable the keyboard, we have a solution for that below.

How to use a USB keyboard on a laptop

Connecting a USB keyboard to a laptop really is as simple as plugging it in. The drivers for the hardware will automatically install, and then you’re good to go. The keyboard that is built into your laptop will also continue to work while the USB one is plugged in too.

How to use a Bluetooth keyboard on a laptop

The process for a wireless keyboard isn't much more difficult:

1. Make sure Bluetooth is turned on on your laptop by heading to Settings > Devices > Bluetooth & other devices
2. Turn on your keyboard, making sure it has enough battery and is in pairing mode if necessary
3. Back on your laptop, click 'Add Bluetooth or other device' and then 'Bluetooth'
4. It will now search for your device, and with a bit of luck, find the keyboard. Simply click on it to complete connection
   

How to permanently disable laptop keyboard

If you want to permanently disable the keyboard on your laptop it’s going to be a little more involved. You’ll have to turn off Windows' ability to automatically install the driver again; otherwise the keyboard will spring back into life every time you reboot your machine.

To permanently disable your keyboard do the following:

1. Go to start, and into the search box type ‘gpedit.msc’
   
   
   
   
2. Click on the Computer Configuration file, and then head into Administrative Templates > System, Device Installation
3. Then go into Device Installation Restrictions. You’ll see a number of options on the right. Right click on Prevent Installation of Devices not described by other policy settings and edit this option, setting it to enabled
   

Now you’re done this, you can go back into your Device Manager and follow the steps at the top of this article. Uninstall the driver for your keyboard, and when you reboot your PC it will not automatically install it again, and the keyboard on your laptop will no longer function.

This is very much a permanent change, so there's one more important step to take if you might want to re-activate the keyboard at any point in the future. 

At this point, it’s a good idea to go back into gpedit.msc and revert the change so you’ll be able to install the driver again in the future should you so desire.