- Microsoft released an emergency fix for a nasty bug
- This made the recovery environment unusable in Windows 11 25H2
- This is the feature that helps you recover from boot failure
Microsoft quickly rolled out an emergency patch for Windows 11 outside of its usual update schedule to address a major issue with Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE).
XDA Developers spotted the “out-of-band” update just released by Microsoft, known as patch KB5070773 for Windows 11 25H2. This was the last cumulative update (for October) and included bug version 25H2, which prevented USB keyboards and mice from working in WinRE.
WinRE is the feature that comes into play if your PC won’t boot, so it’s vital when disaster strikes your Windows 11 system and you need to recover. The inability to use the mouse or keyboard renders the environment effectively useless.
In other words, those who were using Windows 11 25H2 and grabbed the October Update, then encountered a major problem with their PC, have had no luck fixing that problem using traditional recovery methods.
Analysis: don’t hang around – update
As you can imagine, you really don’t want to get stuck in a boot failure without a recovery palette. So, if you’re running Windows 11 25H2 with the latest October Update applied, I strongly advise you to download this emergency patch today – now, in fact.
The patch will be installed by Windows Update, so you need to head to that panel in the Settings app (just type “Windows Update” into the taskbar search box). Then click “Check for updates” to do just that, and you should see patch KB5070773. At this point, I imagine Microsoft is offering it for all Windows 11 25H2 PCs (given that it was first rolled out last night and given its importance).
If you don’t see the update, your system may already have it installed, even if you saw an indication of it. Be careful, it’s possible to miss these items and you can always check your update history (in the Windows Update panel) to see if KB5070773 is listed.
If this fix isn’t offered to you and you certainly don’t already have it, you can manually install the update, provided you have enough confidence in your Windows 11 PC to do so. In this case, as XDA points out, you can find the patch available for download here in Microsoft’s update catalog.
Not too long ago, in August 2025, Microsoft removed the ability to reset a Windows 11 PC, which again required an emergency patch – so the software giant is on a roll when it comes to putting a damper on recovery work.
