Windows 10 comes with a whole bunch of pre-installed apps, although, not all of them are as popular as the ubiquitous Paint. Unfortunately, Microsoft doesn’t let users easily uninstall all of them, although, there is a workaround to this problem if you truly want to get rid of all the junk that ships with your Windows PC. So without further ado, let’s get right to it and see how you can uninstall these ‘Universal Apps’ from your system to reclaim some storage space and regain some control over a chaotic start menu:
Note: Before we begin, it’s important to realize that we’ll need to be cautious before uninstalling any of the Universal Apps, because removing some of them may cripple Cortana. For example, removing Bing News might break Cortana’s ability to bring you news, and removing Alarms and Clock might make it difficult for the digital assistant to set reminders.
Uninstall Windows 10’s Built-in Apps the Easy Way
- Bring up the Start Menu by pressing the Windows Key on your keyboard and right click on the app you want to uninstall. With many of the apps on your Start Menu, you’ll be presented with an ‘Uninstall’ option as you can see in the screenshot below, so just click on that to get rid of the unwanted app.
This is a quick and painless way to remove pre-installed bloatware on your Windows PC, but it doesn’t work with every Universal App. While you can uninstall Twitter, Skype, Money, News, Solitaire and a few other apps this way, you’ll have to resort to something stronger to get rid of many of the other built-in apps that come as part of the package.
Uninstall Windows 10’s Built-in Apps via Windows PowerShell (Command Prompt)
- First off, hit the Windows Key and X simultaneously to bring up the ‘power user menu’. Now click on ‘Windows PowerShell (Admin)’ option as seen in the screenshot below.
Note: On computers not yet updated to the ‘Creators Update‘, you’ll get Command Prompt options instead of ‘PowerShell’, so all you need to do is type ‘PowerShell’ into the start menu search box, right-click on ‘Windows PowerShell’, and select the ‘Run as administrator’ option.
- Once you have the PowerShell window open, copy / paste the following code if you want to uninstall the 3D Builder app:
Get-AppxPackage *3dbuilder* | Remove-AppxPackage
- To uninstall any other app, just change the name within the two asterisks depending on what you want to remove (keep the asterisks untouched). So if you’re not enamored with card games, you can easily get rid of Solitaire with the following code:
Get-AppxPackage *solitairecollection* | Remove-AppxPackage
- While this neat little trick will let you get rid of most of the bundled apps, it won’t let you uninstall some of the critical apps that are baked into the system, like Cortana or Edge, as you can see in the screenshot below:
Note: While you won’t be able to fully uninstall apps like Cortana or Edge, you should be able to disable them by going over to ‘Turn Windows Features On or Off’ from ‘Control Panel > Programs’ or ‘Control Panel > Programs and Features’ depending on your settings.
Now that you’ve installed a bunch of built-in apps on your Windows 10 PC, what if you have a change of heart want to get a few back? Worry not, because there’s always a way to do that:
How to Reinstall all Built-in Apps
- To reinstall these apps, you’ll again need to open the PowerShell window as described earlier in the article. Then copy / paste the following and press ‘Enter’:
Get-AppxPackage -AllUsers| Foreach {Add-AppxPackage -DisableDevelopmentMode -Register "$($_.InstallLocation)\AppXManifest.xml"}
- You may get a couple of error codes saying, ‘app already installed’ or ‘newer version of app already installed’. Those are normal, so just disregard them and restart your PC.
That’s it, folks! With one fell swoop, you’ve got back all the uninstalled built-in apps on your PC.
SEE ALSO: Microsoft to Finally End Free Windows 10 Upgrades on 31st December
Uninstall / Reinstall Built-in Apps on Your Windows 10 PC
The only problem with executing the above code is that it doesn’t let you pick and choose which apps to re-install, so you’ll end up reinstalling all the removed apps whether you want it or not. Which means you might again have to painstakingly get rid of each redundant app one by one. Either way, now that you know how to get rid of all that bloat on your PC, give it a go and let us know how it went because we love hearing from you.
