Windows 11 includes many background services, consumer features, and visual effects that are unnecessary in a virtual machine environment.

If you are running Windows 11 in VirtualBox or VMware for testing, development, browsing, or general use, disabling these extras can significantly improve performance and reduce resource usage.

This guide provides a single PowerShell script that creates a cleaner, lighter Windows 11 installation inside a VM.

Why Windows 11 Feels Heavy in a VM

By default, Windows 11 enables:

• Search indexing
• SysMain (Superfetch)
• Xbox services
• Widgets
• Telemetry services
• Edge background tasks
• OneDrive auto-start
• Background apps
• Visual animations

Inside a virtual machine, these consume CPU, RAM, and disk I/O that could otherwise be used by your applications.

What This Script Does

The optimisation script:

• Enables Ultimate Performance power plan
• Disables SysMain
• Disables Windows Search indexing
• Disables telemetry services
• Turns off hibernation
• Disables background apps
• Disables Widgets
• Disables Xbox services and removes Xbox apps
• Disables Edge background tasks
• Uninstalls OneDrive
• Reduces visual effects

The result is a lighter and more responsive Windows 11 VM.

How to Apply the Optimisation

1. Open PowerShell as Administrator
2. Paste the following script
3. Press Enter
4. Reboot after completion

Full Debloat Script

# Enable Ultimate Performance
$ultimate = "e9a42b02-d5df-448d-aa00-03f14749eb61"
powercfg -duplicatescheme $ultimate 2>$null
$scheme = (powercfg -list | Select-String "Ultimate Performance").ToString().Split()[3]
powercfg -setactive $scheme# Disable SysMain
Stop-Service SysMain -Force -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
Set-Service SysMain -StartupType Disabled# Disable Windows Search
Stop-Service WSearch -Force -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
Set-Service WSearch -StartupType Disabled# Disable Telemetry
Stop-Service DiagTrack -Force -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
Set-Service DiagTrack -StartupType Disabled# Disable Hibernation
powercfg -h off# Reduce Visual Effects
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\VisualEffects" /v VisualFXSetting /t REG_DWORD /d 2 /f# Disable Background Apps
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\BackgroundAccessApplications" /v GlobalUserDisabled /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f# Disable Widgets
reg add "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Dsh" /v AllowNewsAndInterests /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f# Disable Xbox Services
$services = "XblAuthManager","XblGameSave","XboxGipSvc","XboxNetApiSvc"
foreach ($svc in $services) {
    Stop-Service $svc -Force -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
    Set-Service $svc -StartupType Disabled -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
}# Remove Xbox Apps
Get-AppxPackage *Xbox* | Remove-AppxPackage -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue# Disable Edge Background Tasks
reg add "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Edge" /v StartupBoostEnabled /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f
reg add "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Edge" /v BackgroundModeEnabled /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f# Uninstall OneDrive
taskkill /f /im OneDrive.exe 2>$null
Start-Process "$env:SystemRoot\System32\OneDriveSetup.exe" "/uninstall" -NoNewWindow -WaitWrite-Host "Windows 11 Debloat Complete. Reboot recommended."

Read the full article: https://luckyy.uk/how-to-debloat-and-optimise-windows-11-in-a-virtual-machine-clean-setup-guide/