Laptop touchpad not working- Here’s your solution

So, your Windows laptop’s touchpad stopped working all of a sudden? Well, we have compiled a list of possible solutions that could solve your particular issue. While some settings might be slightly different according to the manufacturer, but you can figure out what to do if you understand what I am doing here. For the ease of navigation through settings, we suggest you connect a mouse to your laptop. Though we have also covered how to get to these settings without a mouse. Now, let’s get to it!

Enabling a ‘disabled’ touchpad

With a mouse:

1. Click the Windows Button  in the bottom-left corner of your screen.
2. Then click on the Windows Settings Gear 
3. Click on the Devices tile 
4. From the side menu, click on Mouse & Touchpad 
5. Now, click Additional Mouse Options
6. Make sure you’re in the ClickPad Settings tab. Click on ClickPad Enable.

This should make the touchpad working again. If this button is greyed out(not clickable), try disabling and then enabling the ClickPad. If the touchpad is not working still, move to next probable solution.

Without a mouse:

1. Press the Windows button on the keyboard and search Settings. Press Enter
2. On the settings screen, press Tab 3 times. Then with arrow keys move the selector down on Mouse & Touchpad and press Enter
3. Now, press Tab until Additional mouse options is highlighted. Press Enter
4. Highlight ClickPad Enable and press Enter. If ClickPad Enable is greyed out, try to disable and then enabling ClickPad. If this doesn’t work, move to the next probable solution.

Driver Update

“A device driver is a computer program that operates or controls a particular type of device that is attached to a computer. A driver provides a software interface to hardware devices, enabling operating systems and other computer programs to access hardware functions without needing to know precise details of the hardware being used.“- Wikipedia

Sometimes, these drivers develop glitches and the hardware starts to malfunctions. A quick fix for this is to update these drivers or install a new one. Let’s start with updating the touchpad drivers:

• Press the Windows button on the keyboard, search for Device Manager and press Enter
• Locate Mice and other pointing devices now. Expand the field and double click on Synaptics SMBus TouchPad

• Then change the tab to Driver. Select Update Drivers

• Then click Search automatically for updated driver software. Now the system will itself search for compatible driver software and update it.

Enable touchpad from BIOS

Another possibility can be that the touchpad has been disabled in the BIOS setup. Follow the steps below to access BIOS and enable the touchpad:

1. Restart the laptop. When the laptop starts to boot up again, press F2 key multiple times to enter the BIOS settings of your laptop
2. Use the keyboard’s arrow keys to navigate to Advanced BIOS settings
3. Then locate Device Options on the screen. Navigate to it and press Enter
4. Now locate Internal Pointing devices. Use arrow keys to select Enable button. Press Enter
5. Press Esc button on the keyboard and reach to root menu of BIOS.Go to Exit Menu and select Save and Exit. Touchpad should work fine now

If the touchpad still isn’t working, it is likely that there is a hardware failure and you need to contact a trained professional to repair or replace the touchpad. We can help you with that, actually, that’s what we actually do. Visit the page General Laptop repair to book a case for your laptop’s repair.