Here’s an interesting question from one of our readers:
I have few programs installed on my laptop computer which runs the Windows 10 operating system. I want to speed up my laptop startup time. I thought of minimizing the number of apps that runs on Startup. Ideally, i would like to automatically launch only some these my applications whenever I start it, like my Anti-Virus, Microsoft Teams and Zoom. I hope we have a way to achieve it. Any tips and tricks on how to allow only specific apps to run by default?
Thanks for this question. Windows provides several ways to launch application/programs on startup. We’ll provide a run-down of these methods in this short tutorial.
Setting programs to launch on startup
Method 1: through Settings
- From your task bar, hit the Start (Windows) icon (or the Windows Key) then, go ahead and type Startup Apps.
- Scroll and select the application name in the provided list, and switch it on to open it at the start.
Method 2: through Task Manager
- Right-click on the taskbar and select Task Manager.
- Click on Start-up, and right-click on the application name, and select Enable to open the application at the start.
Method 3: Place the application shortcut file in the Start-up folder
To set up a program to launch in the startup, we must first locate the program file path.
- Click on the Start or Windows key and search for the application name.
- The screenshot will provide an example to set the Zoom application to launch when the machine starts.
- Right-click on your application and select Open file location.
- Copy the program file from the path.
Method 4: Place the program shortcut in Start-up folder
We will be placing the program file copied under the path provided in Windows 10.
- Press the Windows key + R simultaneously and type shell:startup in the Run Search box.
- In the file explorer opened, paste the program file copied under this path.
- Reboot your machine to get this tested. Follow the same steps to open any of the programs at the start.