Touchpad not working in Windows 11: how to fix it

Applies to: Windows 11 laptops and 2-in-1s whose built-in touchpad stopped moving the pointer, stopped clicking, or lost its scrolling and gestures. Windows 10 has similar settings under Settings > Devices > Touchpad.

Match your symptom

What you see	Likely cause	Start with
Touchpad does nothing, but a USB mouse works	Touchpad switched off by a key or in Settings	Fix 1
Touchpad dies whenever a mouse or its receiver is plugged in	The mouse-connected setting is off	Fix 2
Pointer moves, but tap-to-click, two-finger scrolling or swipes don’t work	Gesture settings, or a touchpad that isn’t a precision touchpad	Fix 3
No Touchpad page in Settings, or a warning icon in Device Manager	Driver missing, disabled or failed	Fix 4, Fix 5
Stopped right after a Windows or driver update	Driver change	Fix 5
Built-in keyboard and touchpad both dead	Internal connection, chipset driver or hardware	Fix 5, Fix 6
Clicks feel stiff or the touchpad bulges	Hardware, possibly a swollen battery	When the touchpad itself has failed

If the pointer is gone with every device, not only the touchpad, our disappearing cursor guide is the better fit. If a mouse moves but won’t click, see mouse moves but won’t click.

Getting around without a pointer

The quickest workaround is a USB or Bluetooth mouse. If you don’t have one, the keyboard can do everything below:

• Win + I opens Settings, and Win + X followed by M opens Device Manager.
• Tab and the arrow keys move between items, Enter opens one, and Space flips a switch or ticks a box.
• Shift + F10 works like a right-click on the selected item.
• In Settings, typing into the search box and pressing Enter jumps straight to a page, such as “touchpad”.

If a plugged-in mouse isn’t detected either, the problem is wider than the touchpad; our USB device not recognized guide covers that.

Fix 1: Turn the touchpad back on

Laptops can switch the touchpad off at two levels, and either one makes it look broken.

• The touchpad key. Look along the top row for a key with a touchpad icon, often a crossed-out rectangle. On some laptops you press it on its own, on others together with Fn. The key differs by model, so check the laptop’s manual if you can’t spot it. A few HP models instead use a small light or a double-tap in a corner of the touchpad itself.
• The Settings switch. Press Win + I and go to Bluetooth & devices > Touchpad. Microsoft’s touch gestures page gives this same path for Windows 11. Make sure the Touchpad switch at the top is on.

If there is no Touchpad page at all, Windows isn’t seeing the touchpad as a touchpad, which points to a driver problem. Go to Fix 4.

Some laptops also ship a maker app (for example from Lenovo, Dell, HP or ASUS) with its own touchpad on/off control, and older Synaptics or ELAN drivers add a settings tab of their own. If Windows says the touchpad is on but it still does nothing, check those too.

Fix 2: It stops when a mouse is connected

Windows 11 can turn the touchpad off automatically whenever a mouse is plugged in, which is handy for some people and baffling for others. The receiver of a wireless mouse, or a Bluetooth mouse that is still paired, counts as a connected mouse even if it’s sitting in a bag.

1. Open Settings > Bluetooth & devices > Touchpad.
2. Select the Touchpad heading (not the switch) to expand it.
3. Tick Leave touchpad on when a mouse is connected. The wording can vary slightly between builds.

This option isn’t described on Microsoft’s touchpad pages, and it may be missing on laptops whose touchpad isn’t a precision touchpad. If you can’t find it, unplug the mouse receiver or turn off Bluetooth for a moment to see whether the touchpad wakes up; if it does, look for a similar setting in the laptop maker’s app.

Fix 3: Taps, scrolling or gestures don’t work

When the pointer moves but tapping, two-finger scrolling or three-finger swipes do nothing, the touchpad hardware is fine; the settings or the driver type are the issue.

Check whether it’s a precision touchpad. Microsoft notes that some gestures work only with precision touchpads, which use Windows’ own touchpad support instead of a maker’s driver. On most PCs, the top of the Touchpad settings page says when the PC has one, and only then shows the full set of gesture options. If yours doesn’t, gestures are controlled by the maker’s driver or app, so look there.

Review the gesture settings. In Settings > Bluetooth & devices > Touchpad, expand each section and check what is turned on:

• Taps: single-finger tap to click, two-finger tap to right-click, and the touchpad sensitivity. A sensitivity set to the lowest level can make taps seem to fail while you type.
• Scroll and zoom: two-finger scrolling, the scrolling direction and pinch to zoom.
• Three-finger gestures and Four-finger gestures: these have drop-down menus for swipes and taps, which Microsoft’s gestures page lists as places to change what each gesture does.

Section names can differ a little by Windows build, and the Taps and Scroll section names above are as they commonly appear rather than confirmed on Microsoft’s pages. If gestures were customized and you’d rather start over, look for a Reset button for touchpad settings on the same page, where your build shows one.

For reference, Microsoft lists these default precision touchpad gestures: two fingers to scroll or pinch-zoom, a two-finger tap for more commands, three fingers up for all open windows, three fingers down for the desktop, three fingers left or right to switch apps, and four fingers left or right to switch desktops. If only one app ignores scrolling, test in another app before changing settings.

Fix 4: Check the touchpad in Device Manager

Right-click Start and open Device Manager. Microsoft’s touchpad troubleshooting page says to look for the touchpad under Human Interface Devices or Mice and other pointing devices.

It often isn’t called “touchpad”. Inside a laptop, a touchpad connects over an internal bus rather than USB, and Microsoft’s touchpad bus guidelines name I2C, USB and, from Windows 11, SPI as the supported connections. In practice, that usually shows up as an entry such as I2C HID Device under Human Interface Devices, with a matching HID-compliant mouse under Mice and other pointing devices, or as a Synaptics or ELAN entry.

• A down-arrow icon means the device is disabled. Right-click it and select Enable device.
• A yellow warning icon means Windows has a problem with it. Double-click the entry to read the status message, then move on to Fix 5.
• Nothing that looks like a touchpad, only an Unknown device or an entry under Other devices: the touchpad’s driver, or the chipset driver it depends on, isn’t installed.

If you can’t tell which entry is the touchpad, select View and then Show hidden devices; a faded entry is one Windows knows about but can’t currently see.

Fix 5: Update, roll back or reinstall the driver

Microsoft’s touchpad troubleshooting page recommends Windows Update as the first route for touchpad drivers, then Device Manager. Install everything pending in Settings > Windows Update, including drivers listed under Advanced options > Optional updates, and restart.

Then work through the Device Manager options from Microsoft’s Device Manager driver page on the touchpad entry you found in Fix 4:

• Roll back if the touchpad stopped after an update: right-click the entry, select Properties, open the Driver tab and choose Roll Back Driver, pick a reason and select Yes. You need administrator rights, and the button is unavailable when there’s no earlier driver to go back to.
• Update: right-click the entry, select Update driver and then Search automatically for updated driver software.
• Reinstall: right-click the entry, select Uninstall device, confirm with Uninstall, and restart from the Start menu. Windows tries to reinstall the driver as it starts. According to Microsoft, a reinstall makes Windows Update fetch the latest touchpad driver.

Before you uninstall, plug in a mouse or get comfortable with the keyboard steps above, because the touchpad stays dead until the driver is back. Uninstall only the touchpad entries, not the I2C or Serial IO controllers listed under System devices, unless the laptop maker’s support tells you to.

If the keyboard and touchpad both stopped, the shared internal connection is the likely link. On many laptops it relies on the chipset or Serial IO driver, so download the chipset and touchpad drivers for your exact model from the maker’s support site rather than from a driver updater tool. Our laptop keyboard fixes cover the keyboard side.

Fix 6: Full shutdown, UEFI and firmware

A restart fully reloads drivers, but Shut down may not when Fast Startup is on, because Windows saves part of its state to disk. If the touchpad works after a restart but fails again after a shutdown, try turning off Fast Startup.

Some laptops have a setting in UEFI (BIOS) setup that turns off the internal pointing device. The key to open setup varies by maker, often F2, F10, Del or Esc during start-up. Look for a touchpad or internal pointing device option, change nothing else, and save only if you changed that one setting. If the setup screens accept a pointer and the touchpad moves it there, the hardware works and the cause is in Windows.

The maker may also offer a firmware (BIOS) update that mentions touchpad fixes. Read the release notes first, keep the laptop plugged in throughout, and don’t interrupt the update, because a failed firmware update can stop the laptop from starting.

When the touchpad itself has failed

If the touchpad doesn’t respond with the right driver, isn’t listed anywhere in Device Manager, and Windows has been fully updated, the touchpad, its ribbon cable or the board it connects to may have failed. That’s a job for the laptop maker or a repair shop, especially under warranty.

Warning: if the touchpad sits higher than it used to, clicks feel stiff or the case bulges, the battery underneath may be swelling. Stop using the laptop, unplug it, don’t press on the area, and contact the maker. A swollen lithium-ion battery is a safety risk, not a driver problem.

After liquid spills, turn the laptop off and get it checked before you try any of the fixes above.

Known issues

As of November 2026, Microsoft’s Windows 11, version 25H2 known issues and notifications page (last updated November 5, 2026) lists no open issue with touchpads or other pointing devices. The one item still open concerns USB audio devices.

Two input problems appear on the resolved issues list for version 25H2: USB keyboards and mice not working in the Windows Recovery Environment after update KB5066835, fixed by KB5070773 on October 20, 2025, and mouse pointer settings resetting on some non-English installations after KB5120998, fixed by KB5124008 on September 8, 2026. Neither was a touchpad fault, but both show why a fully updated PC is the first thing to check.

Related guides

• Mouse cursor disappears in Windows 11/10: 7 fixes
• Mouse moves but won’t click in Windows 11: how to fix it
• Keyboard not working in Windows 11: how to fix it
• USB device not recognized in Windows 11: how to fix it
• How to disable Fast Startup in Windows 11 and 10

Official sources

• Microsoft: Fix touchpad problems in Windows
• Microsoft: Touch gestures for Windows
• Microsoft: Update drivers through Device Manager in Windows