14 DAY TRIAL // It’s not a secret that some Windows updates fail to install and in most of the cases, there’s a problem with the Windows Update service that needs to be quickly rebooted in order to solve the stuck update downloading process.
This can be done in several ways, including from the Services list on your system (type Services in the Start menu and hit Enter, look for Windows Update and choose the Restart option), but there’s no doubt that for power users, it’s a lot easier to do the whole thing from the Command Prompt or PowerShell.
Fortunately, it all comes down to just two different commands that need to be launched with administrator privileges in either Command Prompt or PowerShell.
First of all, you need to stop the Windows Update service, so copy and paste the following command:
net stop wuauserv
If you decide to reboot your computer, the Windows Update service should restart automatically. Otherwise, you can use the following command to start the service:
net start wuauserv
Keep in mind, however, that these are just the basic commands to restart the Windows Update service, and not to reset it, as this is a much more complex process and involves some other commands that Microsoft itself detailed here.
We’ve heard that simply restarting the Windows Update service helps in many cases where Windows 10 updates, including cumulative ones, get stuck during the download process, but this is not a solution working in 100 percent of the cases. In fact, it’s been proved that sometimes nothing works when cumulative updates can’t be installed, and in this case the only thing that we can do is wait for Microsoft to provide a fix.
As for Windows 10 users encountering problems with Windows Updates, there’s also a troubleshooter whose purpose is to provide assistance to those experiencing issues, and you can launch it by typing Troubleshoot in the Start menu.