How to Enable/Disable Print Spooler Service on Windows 10/11 PC – Guide
PrintNighmare is a zero-day vulnerability that exploits a critical stream running a compromised printer (local or remote) to take control of your PC. You can learn more about how it works. All versions of Windows are currently in the crosshairs because the vulnerability is in the Windows Print Spooler Service (spoolsv.exe), which manages print jobs. Until Microsoft releases an appropriate hotfix, one way to fix the situation yourself is to change a specific printer policy using the Group Policy Editor. This will prevent remote connection requests from coming in to your printer. However, this only works on Professional editions of Windows 10.)
If you cannot change the group policy setting (for example, if you are running Home Windows 10 edition), you can completely disable the print spooler service on your computer by disabling the Windows Services window. Do you want to disable the print spooler service? Windows 10 runs the service to keep your print and fax jobs running smoothly, but there might be reasons you might need to stop it. One of the reasons some people shut down the service is because of increased PrintNightmare vulnerability, which could allow hackers to take over and remotely control PCs. While Microsoft is releasing a security advisory about this exploit and working on a suitable fix, you can disable the vulnerable service.
How to enable or disable print spooler service in Windows 11/10
Enable or disable the print spooler service through services
Type “cmd” and press Enter.
In the Services.msc window, type the following and press Enter: networking.msc The networking.msc window will open. In it, you’ll see a list of all the services that are running on your computer. You can right-click on any of these services and select Properties to get more information about it, such as its name, description, and how much CPU time it is using.
In the Services window, scroll down and locate the Print Spooler service.
To open the properties window for an entry, double-click it. ..
In the properties window, under the General tab, click on the Start button button to enable the service.
To stop this particular service, click the Stop button.
Enable or Disable Print Spooler Service via Command Prompt
To invoke the Run dialog box, right-click on the My Computer icon and select Properties. In the General tab, click on the Advanced button. In the Advanced System Settings dialog box, click on the Environment Variables button. In the Environment Variables dialog box, under User variables, click on the New button. In the New User Variable dialog box, type CMD in the Name field and press OK. Under Value field, type cmd /c start “C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\Windows Performance Toolkit\Performance Monitor\WPToolkit64.exe” For example: CMD /c start “C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\Windows Performance Toolkit\Performance Monitor\WPToolkit64.exe” ..
In the Run dialog, type cmd and press CTRL+SHIFT+ENTER to open Command Prompt in elevated mode.
netstat -an | grep Print Spooler
To disable the service, type the command below and press Enter. ..
You can now exit the command prompt. ..
Enable or disable the print spooler service through system configuration
To invoke the Run dialog box, right-click on the My Computer icon and select Properties. In the General tab, click on the Advanced button. In the Advanced System Settings dialog box, click on the Environment Variables button. In the Environment Variables dialog box, under User variables, click on the New button. In the New User Variable dialog box, type CMD in the Name field and press OK. Under Value field, type cmd /c start “C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\Windows Performance Toolkit\Performance Monitor\WPToolkit64.exe” For example: CMD /c start “C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\Windows Performance Toolkit\Performance Monitor\WPToolkit64.exe” ..
In the System Configuration utility, type msconfig and press Enter to open the system configuration.
On the Services tab in the console, find the Print Spooler service. ..
To enable the print spooler service, please check the box and click the Apply button button.
To disable the print spooler service, uncheck the box and click the Apply button button.
Final note
How to Enable/Disable Print Spooler Service on Windows 10/11 PC If you are using Windows 10 or 11, you can enable or disable the print spooler service. To enable the print spooler service, open the Control Panel and click on the “Print” icon. Under “Print Options”, select “Enable Print Spooler Service”. If you are using Windows 8.1 or 8, you can also enable or disable the print spooler service by going to the “Control Panel” and clicking on “Print”. Under “Print Options”, select “Enable Print Spooler Service”.
