Step-by-Step Guide: How to Enable Secure Boot in Windows 11

In Windows 11, Microsoft has made secure boot mandatory for installing Windows.

Secure boot is a security feature provided by Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) that prevents your system from being vulnerable to malware during the start-up process.

By using the secure boot, you can only boot your system from the trusted software of the equipment manufacturer. Your system allows such software to boot.

In this article we want to explain How to enable secure boot windows 11.

What is Secure Boot?

Secure Boot is a feature in your computer software that controls which operating systems are allowed to run on the computer. This feature is both a good thing and a bad thing. On the one hand, it can block certain classes of aggressive malware and protect your primary device from ransomware.

On the other hand, it can prevent you from installing a second operating system on your system, giving you two options to choose from when you turn on your computer. Therefore, if you want to work with Linux operating systems, Secure Boot will cause you problems.

What is UEFI?

UEFI, which is short for Unified Extended Firmware Interface Forum, was developed by the technology giants Intel, AMD, and Microsoft. The new UEFI standard exactly eliminated the problems of the old BIOS version.

The low-level UEFI software, in addition to the updated graphical user interface, is also able to start the computer from memories with a capacity higher than 2.2 TB.

In other words, the limit of this type of new generation launcher in interaction with the main memory is 9.4 zettabytes; this amount of interactive memory capacity limit is three times the total information circulating in the Internet space! So you won’t have any restrictions on using all kinds of memories in all types of capacities.

UEFI is a very light operating system inside the motherboard, which is close to the hardware, at the top level of drivers, and can work much more efficiently than BIOS. UEFI works so independently that it can be loaded from the memory on the motherboard chip, hard disk, or at the network level.

Different computers have different management options in the UEFI environment, but the basic management options of all of them can be seen in the above description.

To access UEFI, just like BIOS, you must press the corresponding button when the computer is turned on; but if you need to access lower-level settings, you have to do it through the Windows boot options menu.

How to Check if Secure Boot Is Enabled

Before entering the BIOS section, you must first check if the secure boot is available and active in your system.

You can check your secure boot by doing the following steps.

1. On the Start menu, search for and click System Information. 
2. From the left panel, click System Summary.
3. Scroll down till you see Secure Boot State and note whether it’s enabled or not.
4. Now, you can also see the BIOS mode your system is using.

How to Enable Secure Boot

When you enable secure startup on your computer, your system becomes more confident.

Because it can resist the attacks of boot loaders on the critical operating system files of your computer, and your system will be more secure.

To convert MBR to GPT partition and change BIOS mode to UEFA, you don’t need to enable secure boot before making changes.

If you want to upgrade your operating system to Windows 11, the following steps can be helpful for you.

Convert MBR Drive Partition to GPT

Windows 11 does not boot up on the MBR drive partition. Hence, you should first convert the disk partition from MBR to GPT.

We recommend that before changing the disk partition, it is better to get a backup version of your files as a safety measure.

You can change your disk partition to GPT using the following methods.

• Right-click on the Start menu icon and click Disk Management.
• Now, right-click on your Disc and open the Properties.

• Select Volumes.
• You can move on over to the next step, If it reads GPT on Partition Style.

Note: if the Partition Style is set as MBR, you should convert it into GPT.

• Right-click on the Disk.
• Click on Convert to GPT Disk.

• Your disk partition will be set as GPT, after the processing is completed.

Change the BIOS Mode From Legacy to UEFI

To remove the restrictions between the software Legacy, the UEFA middleware interface is known.

UEFI is more efficient and has additional security features than the Legacy firmware. It’s also more user-friendly and uses a GPT disk partition that can support up to 9.4ZB of storage.

Below are the steps to change the operating system to UEFI.

Follow the steps below so that you can easily change your operating system to UEFI.

1. While your PC is booting up, the Delete button, or enter the BIOS setup by pressing F2.
2. Open the Boot tab.
3. Set the UEFI to Boot Mode.
4. Hit F10 to save your changes and then, restart your PC.

Enable Secure Boot

You should manually enable it through the BIOS settings if the secure boot state is not enabled on your system.

The basic idea of BIOS is the same, but the BIOS is different depending on the manufacturer of your system.

You can enter the BIOS and enable secure boot through the Windows recovery environment.

1. While your PC is booting up, you can go to the BIOS setting by tapping the BIOS key set by your system manufacturer.
2. Tap either F10, F12, F1, F2, or the Delete button on your keyboard during Windows startup to open the BIOS.
3. Look for the secure boot option in either the Security, Boot, Custom tab or Authentication.
4. Enable Secure Boot. 
5. Hit F10 to save your changes.

You can enable secure boot through the Windows recovery environment in BIOS.

The steps are below:

• Open the Settings on your PC.
• Select Windows Update .
• Click on Advanced options.
• Select Recovery.
• Click the Restart now.

• Choose Troubleshoot.

• Click Advanced Options.
• Select UEFI Firmware Settings.

• Restart your system when prompted. You’ll now enter the BIOS setting.
• Once here, head on over to the Boot tab.
• Enable Secure Boot. 

• Hit F10 to save your changes.

Now the secure boot is enabled on your computer, and your system is more secure.

Note: that sometimes when you switch Secure Boot from OFF to ON, and you can’t boot into the installed system, it’s because your working system was installed with the OFF setting. To fix this problem, you need to reinstall your operating system.

Conclusion

How do you keep your computer safe?

In this article, we tried to introduce ways that you can enable your secure boot.

You can easily enable your secure boot by following the above steps. We suggest that you follow this method to make your computer safe.

Do you use the methods that have been mentioned?

What other solutions do you know to enable secure boot in Windows 11?