Turning off Windows’ firewall allows unauthorized network access on your PC. So unless you have a strong reason to disable the feature, you must keep the firewall turned on at all times.

The only times you may need to disable your firewall are when you’re troubleshooting an issue, testing an app, or using a third-party firewall on your computer. Even then, if you’re disabling the firewall to let an app through your network, add that app to the firewall exception list instead of turning the entire feature off.

How to Turn Off the Firewall on Windows 10 and 11

On both Windows 10 and 11, you’ll use the built-in Windows Security app to disable and enable the firewall. In the following steps, we use a Windows 11 PC.

• To get started, launch Windows Security on your PC. Do this by opening the “Start” menu, searching for “Windows Security”, and clicking the app in the search results.

On the Windows Security window, click “Firewall & Network Protection.”

On the “Firewall & Network Protection” page, select your network profile. To disable the firewall for your current profile, you’ll see “Active” next to that profile, so click that option.

In the “Microsoft Defender Firewall” section, toggle off the option.

Tip: Later, to re-enable the firewall, toggle on the option.

Select “Yes” in the “User Account Control” prompt, and your Windows firewall is now disabled. You may now continue your troubleshooting, testing, or other similar tasks.