To measure how startup apps actually affect boot time, I tested the impact of startup applications in three stages. First, I left all startup apps enabled, just as they were, and recorded the average time Windows took to boot fully. This gave me a baseline for comparison. Once I had that, I moved on to the second stage.

In the second stage, I turned off all startup apps, including the useful ones I usually keep enabled, and restarted my PC several times. As expected, the boot time dropped. That setup wasn’t practical since I still need certain apps to launch at startup—as you probably do too—but it clearly demonstrated the overall impact of startup apps.

Finally, in the third stage, I re-enabled only the essential apps and kept the unnecessary ones disabled. This gave me the most realistic result: a noticeably faster boot without turning off key processes. To make sure the results were accurate, I didn’t rely on a single test for each stage. Instead, I measured the boot time several times and calculated the average.

The three stages I tested the boot time in are referred to as:

• Baseline — all startup apps enabled
• All Disabled — every non-system startup app disabled
• Selective — essential apps enabled, unnecessary ones disabled

Here’s the startup time I recorded on both devices for each stage:

The first device I used for this test had lower-end hardware and was equipped with an HDD instead of an SSD, which is known to have faster boot times. The second device, on the other hand, had the latest specifications and an SSD. Naturally, the first machine was slower by default, so its boot time was expected to lag behind the second.

From the results, you can see that both devices took the longest to boot in the Baseline stage and the least time when all startup apps were disabled. With selective disabling, I was able to reduce boot time without turning off essential apps. Still, it’s evident that startup apps aren’t the only element influencing boot time.

Instead, hardware specifications, such as processor speed, SSD versus HDD, RAM capacity, and even UEFI/BIOS optimization, affect overall boot performance.