What causes the number keys to stop working on Windows 10?

I had the same problem and it seems to be the FancyZones part of Microsoft Powertoys that somehow makes the number keys stop working. I solved the problem by closing Powertoys and reopening it.

Hope this helps

Found Issue #410: PowerToys steals my number keys! that confirms this is likely what caused my problem.


To delete/uninstall the drivers from the registry follow these steps:-

  1. Press Win + X
  2. Choose Device Manager.
  3. In the list of given items,open the keyboard section.
  4. Right click on the keyboard that is shown and click Properties.
  5. In the details tab, select the property to Class Guid.
  6. Now open Windows Registry( press Win + R and type Regedit and hit Enter )
  7. Press Ctrl + F and paste the value and hit Enter .
  8. Press F3 (Finds the next item) till you find something named “DriverInfName” that has Type “REG_SZ” and has the Data as “keyboard.inf”(This would be found on the right side of the window).

  9. Delete the entire folder which would be highlighted on the left side of the window(It would be a tree structured list).

  10. Close the registry(wait for it as it might be doing some changes).

  11. Remove the keyboard.
  12. Restart the computer and before restarting connect the keyboard back again(Note:The start up may take longer than expected as it would be installing the driver).

Note:Your keyboard may not work after this process,It did work for me but only do so if you have an extra keyboard

If you don’t wish to do the aforementioned,to uninstall from the driver from device manager,follow the above steps till 3 and follow these steps after that:

  1. Right click on the keyboard present and click uninstall driver.
  2. Restart the computer and wait to see if the problem still occurs and only then risk it for the registry uninstall.