How to Update All Drivers at Once on Windows 10/11 (Solved)

Problem: How can we keep our drivers updated when there are so many devices (like Bluetooth devices, network cards, video/audio devices, and much more) on any Windows PC?

It is impractical to update so many drivers one by one, so the only way to ensure that your drivers are updated is to do it all at once.

Solution: To update all drivers at once, download Driver Booster and install it. Open the program and click on the Scan button; Driver Booster will display a list of your outdated device drivers; click on Update Now and wait while the program updates all your outdated drivers.

• Manually updating drivers via Device Manager.
• Automatically updating drivers via Windows Update.

Next, I will cover how to update all drivers at once using these three different methods. If you want to see a side-by-side comparison of these three methods, browse to the end of the article.

How to Update All your Drivers at once with Driver Booster

There are other reliable driver updaters like Driver Easy, but only with Driver Booster will you be able to update all drivers at once for free. In other driver updater apps, this is usually a paid feature.

1. Download Driver Booster and install it.
   Download: Driver Booster
   
   (Uncheck all the checkboxes with bundle offers if you don’t want to install these programs on your PC.)
2. On Driver Booster, click on the Scan button and wait for the scan to be complete:
   
3. All the outdated drivers will be selected by default, so you need to click on Update Now to update all of your drivers:
   

While there are no risks in updating your drivers like this, I don’t recommend you update your network card driver unless you have internet issues.

(Driver Booster is one of the must-have programs you need to know about. Do you know all the must-have Windows software in this list I’ve written?)

How to Update your Drivers with Device Manager

You can update drivers via Device Manager, but it is impossible to update all your drivers at once in this way. You will need hours to update all your drivers manually in the Device Manager.

Any PC nowadays easily has over 100 device drivers (mine has 140), which makes updating drivers via Device Manager unfeasible unless you need to update one or two of them.

(For example, when fixing a single known issue like switching the sound from your laptop to TV via HDMI or fixing slow Wi-Fi on Asus laptops.)

To update drivers in the Device Manager, follow the process below:

1. Enter Device Manager on the Windows Search and open the Device Manager:
   
2. On the Device Manager, find the type of device you want to update and expand it:
   
3. Right-click on the specific device and select Update Driver:
   
4. Now, click on Search automatically for drivers:
   

Now, wait while the device manager updates your driver.

Besides taking a lot of time, the device manager is not entirely reliable in updating drivers. Sometimes, it won’t find a new driver, even though there is a new device driver available, as pointed out by Youtube user Menno Roset:

How to Update Drivers with Windows Update

Many people still don’t know that, but starting from Windows 10 it is possible to have your drivers updated when Windows updates.

Or simply put, when you install Windows updates, it will automatically install the needed drivers for all your devices.

Here is how you can update your drivers with Windows Update:

1. Enter Windows Update Settings on the Windows Search and click on the result.
   
2. On Windows Update, click on Check for updates to see if any updates are available. If there is any, proceed with the update.
   

This method is simple, and it sounds perfect, but there are reports of Windows Update installing the wrong drivers.

It happened to me before, and it led me to revert the update to be able to keep playing Divinity: Original Sin 2. A lot of users on Reddit also reported similar issues:

• Windows Update will not inform the current version of all your drivers, so you will probably need to check the drivers one by one in Device Manager, which takes a lot of time.

So, some users choose to disable Windows driver updates.

A Comparison Between the Three Methods

Here is a side-by-side comparison of the pros and cons I’ve found when trying these three methods.

Conclusion

While it is possible to update your drivers via Device Manager or Windows Update, the cons outweigh the pros, as both methods are somewhat unreliable.

So, the best way to update all drivers at once is by using a third-party app such as Driver Booster. It is free and quick and lets you visualize all your device drivers in a list.

There are other reliable driver updaters out there, but they won’t allow you to update all your drivers at once in the free version.

Did you know that it is also possible to uninstall multiple programs at once with a free program? Check it out to keep your PC clean and save time.