I have a PC that should always be on. I recently upgraded to Windows 10 from Windows 7. In Windows 7 I changed the default action of the power button in the start menu to log off from my machine so that I could not accidentally shut it off. However in Windows 10 the start menu changed and this doesn't appear to be possible anymore.
I wonder how the shutdown option can be removed from the start menu. I cannot find any information about it but I expect this to be possible.
Open regedit and go to: Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\PolicyManager\default\Start\HideShutDown
Open the key that says value and change it to 1. Your Shutdown option is now removed for everyone, but all other options are still there. This includes the sign on screen, and alt+ctrl+del screen.
Change it to 0 to bring it back.
This just removes the menu options, won't prevent shutdowns from users with the policy to issue the shutdown command via a command or separate program.
To remove from an already configured profile, change the associated keys in:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\PolicyManager\current\device\Start
To remove the Shut Down, Restart, Sleep, and Hibernate commands from the Start menu and from the screen that is displayed after pressing Ctrl+Alt+Delete:
gpedit in the Command prompt).It does not prevent users from:
shutdown /s to shutdown the computer or shutdown /r to restart the computer.The Group Policy Editor is available only in Pro, Enterprise and Education editions of Windows 10, and not in Windows 10 Home.
More info is given on these pages:
See also the Paweł Iwaneczko's solution - it didn't work on my computer in 2019, but I checked it again on Win 10 Pro 22H2 and now it works! Paweł Iwaneczko's solution additionally prevents users to shutdown a computer by shutdown /s etc.
Very good answer for this question is here and here.
Open the Local Group Policy Editor (Win+R and gpedit.msc)
Go to:
Computer Configuration->Windows Settings->Security Settings->Local Policies->User Rights Assignment->Shut down the system
And finally add/remove specific group of users to allow/prevent them to shutdown the system.
To complete @urbanchaos's answer, it works on Windows 11 and here is the command line :
reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\PolicyManager\default\Start\HideShutDown /v value /t REG_DWORD /d 0x1
Check the value with :
reg query HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\PolicyManager\default\Start\HideShutDown
@Urbanchaos's answer in PowerShell:
Set-ItemProperty -path "HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\PolicyManager\default\Start\HideShutDown" -Name "Value" -Value 1
It appears that the solution that Urbanchaos listed
Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\PolicyManager\default\Start\HideShutDown value 1
only works for Windows 10 1809 and later. For 1803 I have had to edit a similar value.
Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\PolicyManager\current\device\Start HideShutdown 1
I honestly have no idea why this does not work but I'm continuing to look into it.
Power options removed I tried it on my win 10 pc, it worked, but it removes all options in the 'Power' menu:
Option one still works for win 10
Hope this helps! :)
