[6 Ways] What to Do When the Cursor Is Frozen on the Laptop?

My cursor is frozen on the laptop touchpad

"The cursor is frozen on the HP laptop now and then. This morning, I powered on my laptop as usual but I found the cursor wouldn’t move anymore. Then, I restarted the machine, disconnected and reconnected the mouse. I turned normal. However, after several hours, the cursor was frozen again. I feel really upset now as I cannot do anything without using the mouse. Does anyone give me any suggestions?"

Why the cursor is frozen on the laptop?

The PC always goes hand in hand with the cursor. When the latter becomes unresponsive, it can be incredibly frustrating. There can be many causes if the cursor is frozen on the laptop now and then, such as an outdated mouse driver, improper settings, and a virus or malware attack. So, here, the top 6 practical solutions are provided that you can try any of them to tackle the problem of the frozen cursor on the laptop.

How to fix it when the cursor is frozen on the laptop?

As your work efficiency will be badly affected if the cursor constantly gets frozen, 6 reliable methods are given to and hopefully, they can help you out.

Method 1. Switch on the touchpad from the keyboard

When the cursor is frozen on the laptop touchpad, the first thing to do is to check whether the keyboard touchpad switch button is on. Usually, the button looks like a touchpad with a line through it. Hit it and see whether the cursor moves again.

If not, check the row of function keys at the top of the keyboard. As many have similar icons to the one mentioned above, look for the one that seems like a trackpad – typically F7, but sometimes, it could be F5 and F9 as well.

Method 2. Check Windows settings.

To check whether the trackpad has been disabled in Windows 10, in the search box at the left bottom of the desktop, type “mouse” and select “Mouse settings”.

Then, go to "Mouse > Additional mouse options > Hardware > Properties > Change settings > Driver". Now, click on the option "Disable Device" and re-enable once more later.

Method 3. Check for the battery usage

If you’re using a wireless mouse and it keeps getting frozen, there might be insufficient battery power left. In this case, try changing the battery or replacing it with a wired mouse.

Method 4. Scan for viruses and malware

When your laptop is under attack from any viruses or malware, you could also encounter the frozen cursor issue. Thus, it’s imperative to turn to antivirus software for help. Luckily, Windows has its own antivirus tool – Windows Defender. It’s able to efficiently scan for existing viruses and eliminate them from your device.

Method 5. Update the mouse driver

As mentioned at the beginning of the post, if the cursor is frozen on the laptop, your mouse drive could be outdated. Thus, you should ensure the latest version of the drive is successfully installed. Learn to update the mouse driver as follows for your laptop.

1. Press “Win + R” simultaneously to launch the “Device Manager” in Windows 10/8/7. Type “devmgmt.msc” and click on “OK”.

2. Expand the "Mice and other pointing devices" option, right-click on the mouse driver and choose "Update driver".

3. Follow the onscreen guide to finish the rest steps.

Method 6. Free up some C drive storage space

Frankly, this method is based on my own experience last month. One day, I came to work and booted up my PC only to find I was stuck on the screen. The cursor was amazingly sluggish and I had to push the mouse really hard to make it move. Meanwhile, other apps like Microsoft Office and Chrome were much less responsive than before.

Then, I cooled myself down, trying to search for Googler answers using my smartphone. Finally, someone told me that might be caused by a full C drive. So, I opened up the File Explorer and as expected, the C drive was nearly full and the bar had become red.

The C drive held many system-related files and necessary apps, so, I didn’t want to uninstall them from it. Luckily, I had a third-party utility - AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional – that had already been on my PC for several months. One of its features was moving apps from one drive to another without deleting anything. I ran it, followed the intuitive guides, moved some large programs to the D drive, and then, restarted my PC. Yes! Everything turned out to be much smoother – the frozen cursor issue was gone!

If the cursor is frozen on your laptop, try this powerful disk manager to free up space for the C drive. It may alleviate the condition.

Step 1. Install, launch AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional. Click “Free up” on in the top toolbar, and choose “App Mover”.

Step 2. Select the C drive and click on "Next".

Step 3. Tick those large apps and programs you want to move and preset a destination for them. Here, I choose the D drive. Then, hit the "Move" button.

Step 4. Hit "OK" to confirm the operation and the app transfer will begin.

Hit "Finish" when it is complete to end the process.

Conclusion

It’s really annoying when the mouse doesn’t move on your laptop. So, in this post 6 effective ways are offered to help deal with the cursor frozen on the laptop issue. 5 of them are Windows built-in solutions that you should try first. When they don’t work, then, the 6th solution – AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional – is standing by. By moving large software from the system drive- the C drive -to another drive, the laptop can run more smoothly and there’s a high chance that the stuck cursor moves again.  Meanwhile, other than the app mover, many other features including SSD 4K alignment, MBR rebuilding and deleting large files are included.

To use apply this AOMEI product on Servers, you can try the Server edition.