Windows 10 may soon automatically uninstall broken Windows Updates

Image credit: Microsoft

It looks like Microsoft has quietly added a new feature to Windows 10 that will allow the operating system to automatically remove any broken Windows Updates that are causing issues.

This is good news, as Windows 10 has had a number of problematic updates recently, some of which have prevented Windows 10 from loading.

According to a new support document that has just been published by Microsoft, if Windows 10 downloads an update and runs into issues – perhaps due to driver incompatibilities – after trying a number of automatic troubleshooting processes, Windows 10 will remove the latest update if it can't be remedied.

When this happens, a notification will pop up explaining that Windows 10 has removed some ‘recently installed updates to recover your device from a startup failure’.

The update that is causing the issue will also be blocked from being installed automatically for 30 days, during which time Microsoft will hopefully fix any issues with the update.

Quiet launch

This new feature is welcome, as the general advice for people who are experiencing problems after installing an update is to uninstall the update to see if that fixes things. With Windows 10 doing that automatically, it should mean people don’t waste too much time trying to get Windows 10 working again.

Of course, Windows Updates should be fixing problems, not creating them, which is probably why Microsoft has very quietly rolled out this feature. 

According to Windows Latest, which discovered the documentation, Microsoft published the support document with no official announcement, and it apparently even blocked search engines from discovering the page.

Windows 10’s run of problematic updates has been embarrassing for Microsoft, which might explain why the company has quietly launched this feature. Hopefully future Windows Updates won’t be plagued by problems, so we’ll rarely see this feature in action.

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Matt Hanson
Managing Editor, Core Tech

Matt is TechRadar's Managing Editor for Core Tech, looking after computing and mobile technology. Having written for a number of publications such as PC Plus, PC Format, T3 and Linux Format, there's no aspect of technology that Matt isn't passionate about, especially computing and PC gaming. He’s personally reviewed and used most of the laptops in our best laptops guide - and since joining TechRadar in 2014, he's reviewed over 250 laptops and computing accessories personally.