Windows Debloater Tools Suck. Here's What You Can do Instead.

Well, would you look at that? Almost a year later, and I finally post to my “now active” website. lol.

With the impending end of Windows 10 support in October, a lot of people, especially the less “IT-brained” among us, seem to be struggling with the idea of upgrading to Windows 11. Whether it’s due to the hardware requirements or the perception that Windows 11 has more bloat than Windows 10 (it really doesn’t—they’re about equal), people are understandably hesitant.

With that hesitancy, I’ve seen a rise in people posting about Windows 11 debloaters. These scripts are not a good idea to use. They’re often someone’s first PowerShell project and can seriously break core functionality in Windows. I’m not here to tell you how to live your life, but if you do decide to run one of these scripts, please proceed with extreme caution.

I’ve also seen other “tricks” over the years, such as setting the language to International English during install to avoid TikTok and WhatsApp in the Start menu. That only fixes some surface-level stuff. You could also install Windows Education, but that’s not a perfect solution either—it still requires a post-2018 CPU, TPM 2.0, and Secure Boot.

So, what do I do?

Good news! There’s a version of Windows you can install right now that strips away a lot of the bloat: Windows IoT LTSC.

There are editions for both Windows 10 and 11, and there are many benefits to using them:

  • Much Longer support lifecycles (Windows 10 21H1 IoT LTSC gets updates until 2032!)

  • No bloat out of the box, only basic Win32 apps and Edge (You can restore the store later of you need it for Xbox Games or other Store apps)

  • No Bing in Windows Search by default

  • No Copilot

  • Only security updates, so you’ll have a very stable system

  • No hardware requirements for Windows 11, so you can install it on unsupported hardware

IoT LTSC is much better to use than attempting to debloat consumer Windows. You’re not gonna end up with a broken system.

How do I start using it? Where can I buy it?

Well… that’s the catch. Microsoft doesn’t sell LTSC to consumers. But no worries—you can still get it set up. Here’s a guide to get a solid Windows install running:

Note: I’m using Windows 11 for this guide since Windows 10 is losing a lot of driver support over the next year. The steps are essentially the same for both.

  1. Grab the ISO! you can get it from here!     - Bob Pony is a pretty trustworthy guy, but make sure to check the SHA checksum just in case. You can get it with 7zip by right licking the iso and finding the checksum option and pasting it here
  2. Get a USB stick that has at least 8GB of space, and grab a copy of Rufus to write the USB stick
  3. After writing the USB stick, reboot your computer and open your one time boot menu (you can usually do this by mashing F12 or delete while booting)
  4. Select the USB stick, and select the UEFI option if possible.
  5. Go through the Windows Installation process.     6. Don’t click upgrade or repair, click the custom option     7. MAKE SURE YOU SELECT THE RIGHT DRIVE TO INSTALL TO. After you find the proper drive, delete all partitions before you select the new unallocated space and click next     8. Let Windows install and reboot as needed
  6. Go through Windows setup as usual.
  7. Once you hit the desktop, open a new PowerShell window and run this command

irm https://get.activated.win | iex
  1. Select HWID with your keyboard and let the script do its thing
  2. You are now activated! Run Windows update to download a lot of your drivers, and if you’re a gamer, grab your GPU’s drivers from their respective website (Pro tip: Use NVCleasninstall if you have an Nvidia GPU. It’s much nicer than the Nvidia app)
  3. Voilà! You’re all set!

Now, You may find there are some missing things in your system you never realized you would miss. For instance, LTSC doesn’t come with the following:

  • An image viewer(it’ll default to using paint to open image files)
  • A video player
  • An audio player
  • Windows Terminal

Personally, I just use the Microsoft Store to restore a lot of this functionality (and to get the Xbox App). To restore the Store, just run the following in an admin PowerShell window:


wsreset -i

Go forth! Enjoy your new Windows install!