Ever wondered how to bypass the update and force shutdown when it only shows ‘Update and Shut Down’ in Power Off Options? Here are the Brief & Bold solutions about it.

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METHOD #1: Postpone it

If you’re able to postpone the Windows update itself, then that’s the best case. Simply follow these steps:

• Press ‘Win’ key in your keyboard, type ‘Check for updates’ or simply type ‘up’ and the same menu would appear, then press ‘Enter’.

• In ‘More Options’ of the respective settings, you would see ‘Pause updates’ button.

• Click the drop-down arrow and choose how many weeks you want to pause for.

• You would now see ‘Updates paused until [SPECIFIC DATE]’ on the settings screen and ‘Shut Down’ menu available in Power Off Options.

METHOD #2: Force Shutdown

Sometimes, when Windows thinks the updates are important, it won’t even let you pause the updates. Or if you’ve already postponed it a lot. Use METHOD #1 only to see your button disabled in grey. So, in this case, there are two options:

METHOD #2 OPTION #1: Use ‘Run’

This is what I call the “fancy way of forcing shutdown”(use ‘CMD’ and do the same thing if you want to look cooler), but not recommended for daily use:

• Press and hold ‘Win’ and ‘R’ keys together.

• When a small window pops up on the bottom-left corner, type ‘shutdown /s /t 00’, with ‘/s’ standing for ‘shutdown’ and ‘/t’ standing for ‘time delayed before shutting down’. Doing ‘shutdown /s’ alone without the time would set up a delay of 30 seconds as default.

• Your computer would instantly shut down. Seldomly, if the update is very important(e.g., related to major security updates), it would still force updates to go on before shutting down.

METHOD #2 OPTION #2: Press and Hold the Physical Power Button on your PC/Laptop

This is not recommended way more than typing the command in ‘Run’, as this would force your PC/Laptop to shut down without being ready for it and could potentially mess up the electrics inside. That’s why it is used only if your PC/Laptop had frozen and gone unresponsive. But if you really need to force it down:

• Simply look for your PC/Laptop’s Power Button, then press and hold for 10 seconds, or up to the point when it shuts down(you’ll literally hear the power going down).

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Windows updates are annoying – it holds up the time, interrupts the workflow during important presentation at work, or even lags the whole important voice/video call. I remember it once froze my laptop while I was still presenting at school and I had to waste 30 minutes on that single update.

But I must admit that it was also my fault for not updating on time and pausing it too much. Although I suggest updating at least a week later after the newest update comes out to confirm there are no issues on it, let’s keep our devices updated for more security.