How to remove "Get Windows 10" icon from the notification area (system tray) - Part 2

1. Run the Registry Editor

If you prefer a safe, tested, simple, double-click method, skip to Step 6. If you prefer to modify the registry manually, follow Steps 1-5, beginning with this:

Start button
Run
regedit

2. Find the path to add a new GWX key

Expand the Registry Editor keys as follows:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
SOFTWARE
Policies
Microsoft
Windows

3. Add a key called GWX

Click the key that you just navigated to, that is:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows

With that key selected/highlighted, click the Edit menu, then New>Key. Create a new key called GWX.

4. Add a DWORD called DisableGWX

Make sure the new GWX key is selected/highlighted (it should be already) and click the Edit menu, then New>DWORD (32-bit) Value.

5. Set the new DisableGWX DWORD to a value of 1

Make sure the new DisableGWX DWORD is selected/highlighted (it should be already) and click the Edit menu, then Modify. The value will be 0. Change it to 1 and click OK. Reboot and that will remove the icon. If you ever want to restore the icon, set the value back to 0.


That completes the manual steps for changing the registry. The remaining steps show a safe, tested method that requires simply double-clicking a .REG file.

6. To remove the icon, download the plain text REG file attached to this step

To automate the above five steps, download the file attached to this step called GetW10_remove_tray_icon.reg, which contains the following code:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\GWX]
"DisableGWX"=dword:00000001

Select all Open in new window

GetW10_remove_tray_icon.reg

7. Run the downloaded 'remove' REG file

Run the downloaded file by double-clicking it in Windows/File Explorer (or whatever file manager you prefer). You'll need to accept the User Account Control (UAC) dialog (if it's enabled) and the two dialogs below.

8. To restore the icon, download the plain text REG file attached to this step

To restore the icon, download the file attached to this step called GetW10_restore_tray_icon.reg, which contains the following code:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\GWX]
"DisableGWX"=dword:00000000

Select all Open in new window

GetW10_restore_tray_icon.reg

9. Run the downloaded 'restore' REG file

Run the downloaded file by double-clicking it in Windows/File Explorer (or whatever file manager you prefer). You'll need to accept the User Account Control (UAC) dialog (if it's enabled) and the two dialogs below.

10. Clarification of file names in video

In the video, I had different names for the .REG files. After recording the video, I decided to create what I think are much clearer names for the two files:

GetW10_remove_tray_icon.reg
GetW10_restore_tray_icon.reg

When running either of those REG files, if the key and DWORD do not exist, they will be created; if they do exist, the DWORD value will be changed.

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