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How to Disable the Built-In Laptop Keyboard in Windows

Sometimes you don’t want your laptop’s keyboard to take inputs. This is usually because you’re plugging in an external keyboard, either because the built-in one is broken or you just want a larger typing space with a full-sized keyboard.

However, the keyboard being an integral part of your portable computer, disabling its primary input method is a little tricky. Here, we show you how to temporarily and permanently disable the laptop keyboard in Windows.


How to Find Your Laptop Keyboard in Device Manager

Whether you want to disable your laptop keyboard temporarily or permanently, you will need to uninstall the device from Device Manager.

For this, you’ll need to identify the integrated keyboard in Device Manager. Since Device Manager will list all the recognized keyboards, including external keyboards, here’s how you can identify your laptop keyboard from the list.

  1. Press Win + R to open run.
  2. Type devmgmt.msc and click ok to open Device Manager.
  3. In Device Manager, expand the Keyboards section

  4. Right-click on the first keyboard entry (HID/Standard) and select Properties.

  5. In the General tab, check the Location section If it says Location 1 or Plugged into the keyboard portit is likely your laptop’s internal keyboard.

  6. Bluetooth and USB keyboards will show On Bluetooth Low Energy and On US Input Devicerespectively as its location.


If you don’t find your keyboard listed, make sure you have set Device Manager to show hidden devices.

How to Disable the Laptop Keyboard Temporarily

To disable your laptop’s keyboard temporarily:

  1. Right-click on all the HID and PS/2 Keyboard entries with the Properties Location set to Location 1 or Plugged into the keyboard.

  2. Next, select Uninstall Device from the context menu.
  3. Click Yes to confirm the action.
  4. That’s it. You have disabled your laptop’s internal keyboard successfully.

That said, this is a temporary solution. As soon as you restart your system, Windows will look for the connected but unrecognized devices and install the necessary drivers to make them functional.

How to Disable Your Laptop Keyboard Permanently

If you want to disable your laptop keyboard permanently, you can disable your laptop’s built-in keyboard driver PS/2 i8042prt using the Command Prompt.

To disable the laptop keyboard permanently:

  1. Press the win key and type cmd in the Windows search bar.
  2. Right-click on Command Prompt and select Run as Administrator. Click Yes when the UAC prompt appears.
  3. In the Command Prompt window, type the following command and press Enter: 
    sc config i8042prt start= disabled
  4. When the success message appears, close the Command Prompt, and restart your PC. After the restart, your laptop keyboard will stop registering any inputs.

Note that, for this to work, you will need to uninstall your keyboard from Device Manager as shown above and restart your PC.

If you change your mind and want to re-enable the keyboard, you can use the following command in an elevated Command Prompt.

sc config i8042prt start= auto

Once you see the success message, restart your PC to apply the changes.

Disable Laptop Keyboard Permanently in Windows

The built-in chiclet keyboard on your laptop is the primary input method available, so there is no way to disable it with a single click. Also, you wouldn’t want to keep disabling your keyboard accidentally.

If you determine your keyboard to have gone rogue and typing on its own, you can permanently disable it using the Command Prompt and Device Manager.

That said, apart from the hardware issues, your laptop keyboard can act up for many other reasons. To fix your keyboard, check for pending driver updates, use the built-in troubleshooter or simply disable the individual keys.