Disable the Windows Store in Windows 8 and Windows 8.1

By Ian W
in Microsoft (Windows)

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Ian W

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I have been using Windows 8 for a good while now and found that I have very little use for the Windows Store. While I am a big fan of the new toast notifications for Windows Store applications and even some applications in particular (ABC News for example), it is hard to justify their usage as I do not have a touchscreen - something that would make the experience much more enjoyable.

For these reasons and others, I have decided to disable the Windows Store services and put the resources to better use. You may also wish to do the same, so I have created this little tutorial. Note that while there are already tutorials to do this on the Internet, most of them are not as thorough as this one intends to be. See the Bleeping Computer tutorial or the How-To Geek tutorial for examples of this.

Important! Export the Windows Registry keys that you decide to modify before making changes to the Windows Registry, and create a System Restore point before continuing.

Disable access to the Windows Store via Group Policy or Windows Registry Editor

For all users:

Open the Group Policy Editor (gpedit.msc) and navigate to Computer Configuration - > Administrative Templates - > Windows Components. Open the Store entry in the right-hand pane, and enable the Turn off the Store application setting.

Alternatively, open Registry Editor (regedit.exe) and navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\WindowsStore (if the WindowsStore key does not exist, create it). Create a new DWORD value in the WindowsStore key called RemoveWindowsStore. Set its value to 1.

For current user only:

Open the Group Policy Editor (gpedit.msc) and navigate to User Configuration - > Administrative Templates - > Windows Components. Open the Store entry in the right-hand pane, and enable the Turn off the Store application setting.

Alternatively, open Registry Editor and navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\WindowsStore. Create a new DWORD value called RemoveWindowsStore. Set its value to 1.

Disable the Windows Store service

Open Registry Editor and navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Services\WSService. Select the Start value in the right-hand pane and set its value to 4.

Disable the services associated with the Windows Store and Windows Store applications

This next step is important because, as other users have mentioned, these services are known to consume valuable system resources - a situation made worse if you are no longer able to open the Windows Store (after performing the steps above).

Disable Time Broker

In Registry Editor, navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Services\TimeBroker. Select the Start value in the right-hand pane and set its value to 4.

Disable System Events Broker

The task scheduler has a dependency on the system events broker, disabling it is asking for problems - Joe User.

In Registry Editor, navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Services\SystemEventsBroker. Select the Start value in the right-hand pane and set its value to 4.

Unpin the Windows Store tile from the Windows Start screen

If the Windows Store tile is pinned to the Start screen, right click the tile and select the Unpin from Start option that appears in the application bar.

  • topjolly, chrisj1968 and f0rk_b0mb
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Joe User

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Is it wise to disable the Time Broker and System Events Broker? While you might want to disable the store, I can't see why you would disable applications that register with the brokers.

 

I don't think "saving resources" is a valid reason, they are not resource hogs.

 

Edit: The task scheduler has a dependency on the system events broker, disabling it is asking for problems.

Edited by Joe User
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Joe User

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  On 16/03/2014 at 19:59, chrisj1968 said:

I think this isn't so much important about resources but the ability to shut something down one doesn't want.

 

I can't think of a situation where anyone would want to disrupt the task scheduler.

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Ian W

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  On 16/03/2014 at 19:40, georgevella said:

This is good if you (and everyone else who ...) believe you need the extra resources.  Personally, I don't see the benefits considering today's hardware.

  On 16/03/2014 at 19:42, Joe User said:

Is it wise to disable the Time Broker and System Events Broker? While you might want to disable the store, I can't see why you would disable applications that register with the brokers.

 

I don't think "saving resources" is a valid reason, they are not resource hogs.

 

Edit: The task scheduler has a dependency on the system events broker, disabling it is asking for problems.

The whole idea of this tutorial is that if a user does not use the Windows Store or Windows Store applications, they can be completely disabled. If a user still wishes to use Windows Store applications, he or she should not disable the Windows Store, Time Broker or System Events Broker services (something that I thought would be obvious due to the description of these services in Windows 8).

I mentioned resource usage only because several users have reported that Time Broker and System Events Broker spike the CPU or use large amounts of memory. Granted, this only happens if one uses the Windows Store or its applications, but if a user does not use the new Windows 8 application infrastructure, why leave these services running at all?

With that said, thank you very much for alerting me (and the readers of this topic) to the potential dangers of disabling System Events Broker. Would a moderator include this information in the original post, and give credit to Joe User for this?

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zhangm Supervisor

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  On 16/03/2014 at 20:42, Ian William said:

With that said, thank you very much for alerting me (and the readers of this topic) to the potential dangers of disabling System Events Broker. Would a moderator include this information in the original post, and give credit to Joe User for this?

 

Modified as requested.

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Joe User

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After testing, I would like to let you know that disabling the System Events Broker will disable the Task Scheduler completely.

 

DO NOT DO THIS!

 

There are hundreds of applications that rely on the Task Scheduler in Windows 8.

 

If you want to remove the dependency, you can hack the registry to do it, but seriously, this is reckless advice. The average user who thinks they are optimizing their system is going to wind up with a broken Windows update, a broken Windows Media center, optimization and cleanup tasks not being run, and in the long term an unstable system.

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Brandon Live Veteran

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Ugh, do not do any of this unless you really want to hork up your system.

 

  On 16/03/2014 at 19:31, Ian William said:

I have been using Windows 8 for a good while now and found that I have very little use for the Windows Store. While I am a big fan of the new toast notifications for Windows Store applications and even some applications in particular (ABC News for example), it is hard to justify their usage as I do not have a touchscreen - something that would make the experience much more enjoyable.

 

What does having a touchscreen have to do with the Store?

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+LogicalApex MVC

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  On 17/03/2014 at 00:46, Brandon Live said:

Ugh, do not do any of this unless you really want to hork up your system.

What does having a touchscreen have to do with the Store?

Using group policy to disable the store will hurt the system? If so, why is this option included in the OS?

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Joe User

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  On 17/03/2014 at 01:13, LogicalApex said:

Using group policy to disable the store will hurt the system? If so, why is this option included in the OS?

 

I think he was referring to the second part.

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+FloatingFatMan Subscriber¹

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  On 17/03/2014 at 00:46, Brandon Live said:

Ugh, do not do any of this unless you really want to hork up your system.

 

 

What does having a touchscreen have to do with the Store?

 

Agreed completely.  If you don't want to use the store; don't. An allocated resource is not a used resource so not using it or any Modern apps isn't going to use any of your precious CPU time or RAM (unused RAM is wasted RAM).

 

Screwing around with services when you don't know what else they're used for is just asking for trouble.  Disabling the store itself in group policy is likely harmless (and would be there for enterprise reasons), but killing the brokers will just cause you grief.

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duoi Veteran

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This is very good. I will use it because its very good. I never wanted the Microsoft Store, and I'm not sure why Microsoft included it on everyone's computer. This is a very good trick to disable the nasty old Microsoft Store that Microsoft forced on everyone. I will use it to disable my Store on my Windows 8 computer. It is a horrible Store, and I'm not sure why Microsoft forced it on everyone.

 

Regards,

Andrea Borman

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+LogicalApex MVC

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  On 17/03/2014 at 01:15, Joe User said:

I think he was referring to the second part.

Thanks. I was thinking the same, but was wondering why he didn't specifically limit the scope of his warning to exclude the official deactivation method.

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Bryan R.

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  On 17/03/2014 at 13:01, duoi said:

This is very good. I will use it because its very good. I never wanted the Microsoft Store, and I'm not sure why Microsoft included it on everyone's computer. This is a very good trick to disable the nasty old Microsoft Store that Microsoft forced on everyone. I will use it to disable my Store on my Windows 8 computer. It is a horrible Store, and I'm not sure why Microsoft forced it on everyone.

 

Regards,

Andrea Borman

...

 

No... please...

Grand Master

DConnell Member

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  On 17/03/2014 at 13:01, duoi said:

This is very good. I will use it because its very good. I never wanted the Microsoft Store, and I'm not sure why Microsoft included it on everyone's computer. This is a very good trick to disable the nasty old Microsoft Store that Microsoft forced on everyone. I will use it to disable my Store on my Windows 8 computer. It is a horrible Store, and I'm not sure why Microsoft forced it on everyone.

 

Regards,

Andrea Borman

 

How was it "forced on everyone"? You don't have to use it. You can still install traditional desktop software in exactly the same way as before. This is just another way to get software, not the only one.

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Brandon H Supervisor

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  On 17/03/2014 at 14:13, DConnell said:

How was it "forced on everyone"? You don't have to use it. You can still install traditional desktop software in exactly the same way as before. This is just another way to get software, not the only one.

it was a joke

 

Andrea Borman was a user that got banned a long time ago due to being annoying to everyone and obsessing about making windows act like 98

 

I'm surprised you don't remember her :p

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DConnell Member

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  On 17/03/2014 at 14:17, Brando212 said:

it was a joke

 

Andrea Borman was a user that got banned a long time ago due to being annoying to everyone and obsessing about making windows act like 98

 

I'm surprised you don't remember her :p

 

<Gilda Radner> Nevermind . . . . </GR>  :)

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riahc3

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  On 17/03/2014 at 14:17, Brando212 said:

it was a joke

 

Andrea Borman was a user that got banned a long time ago due to being annoying to everyone and obsessing about making windows act like 98

 

I'm surprised you don't remember her :p

Im actually worried it isnt a joke:

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