How to Enable Hibernate in Windows 11 and Windows 10 (2026)

Hibernate saves everything you have open (apps, documents, browser tabs) to your disk and turns the PC completely off. When you switch it back on, you're exactly where you left off, and unlike Sleep it uses no battery while off. Windows 11 and Windows 10 still support Hibernate, but hide it from the power menu by default. This guide shows how to turn it on, add it to the Start menu, and fix it when the option is missing.

Sleep vs Hibernate vs Shut down

Step 1: Make sure Hibernate is enabled

Open Terminal (Admin) or Command Prompt (Admin) (press Win+X) and check which sleep states your PC supports:

powercfg /a

If the output says "Hibernation has not been enabled", turn it on:

powercfg /hibernate on

Run powercfg /a again. Hibernate should now be listed under "The following sleep states are available on this system".

Step 2: Add Hibernate to the power menu

1. Open Control Panel (search for it in Start) and go to Hardware and Sound > Power Options.
2. Click Choose what the power buttons do on the left.
3. Click Change settings that are currently unavailable (needs admin rights).
4. Under Shutdown settings, tick Hibernate (Show in Power menu) and click Save changes.

Hibernate now appears in Start > Power and in the Win+X menu under Shut down or sign out.

While you're on that screen, you can also set the power button or closing the lid to hibernate instead of sleep, which is handy on laptops.

Hibernate from the command line

Useful for shortcuts and scripts:

shutdown /h

To create a desktop shortcut, right-click the desktop, choose New > Shortcut, enter shutdown /h, and name it "Hibernate".

Hibernate automatically after sleeping

A good battery-saving setup: sleep first, then hibernate after a while.

:: hibernate after 3 hours (180 minutes) of sleep, on battery and plugged in
powercfg /change hibernate-timeout-dc 180
powercfg /change hibernate-timeout-ac 180

Set the value to 0 to turn automatic hibernation off again.

Disk space: hiberfil.sys

Hibernate stores memory contents in C:\hiberfil.sys, a hidden file whose size is a share of your RAM. On a small SSD you can make it smaller, though that disables full hibernation and keeps only what Fast Startup needs:

:: smaller file, Fast Startup only (Hibernate menu option disappears)
powercfg /h /type reduced

:: back to full hibernation
powercfg /h /type full

Turning Hibernate off with powercfg /hibernate off deletes hiberfil.sys and also disables Fast Startup.

Troubleshooting

"Hibernate" isn't in the list after running powercfg /a

• Some PCs use Modern Standby (S0 Low Power Idle). Hibernate is still supported on most of them; look for it in powercfg /a after enabling it.
• If the output mentions "The hypervisor does not support this standby state" or a firmware reason, virtualization features (Hyper-V, WSL2, Memory Integrity) or the BIOS can block some sleep states. Update your BIOS and chipset drivers first.
• In a virtual machine, hibernation depends on the virtualization software.

The PC wakes up or doesn't resume properly

:: what woke the PC last time
powercfg /lastwake

:: devices allowed to wake the PC
powercfg /devicequery wake_armed

:: sleep report as an HTML file (Modern Standby PCs)
powercfg /sleepstudy

:: energy efficiency report for any PC
powercfg /energy

Disable wake permissions for a device in Device Manager > device > Properties > Power Management if it keeps waking the PC.

Is Hibernate safe for SSDs?

Yes. Each hibernation writes roughly the amount of RAM in use to the disk, which is small compared to what modern SSDs are rated for. Hibernating once or twice a day has no meaningful impact on SSD lifespan.

Questions? Ask in the comments with your Windows version and what powercfg /a shows.