How to Enable a Keyboard on PC or Mac

Written by Nicole Levine, MFA

|

|

|

|

This wikiHow teaches you how to enable different types of keyboards for Windows and macOS.

Quick Steps

Method 1

Method 1 of 5:

Method 2

Method 2 of 5:

1
Click the Search icon. It’s usually a magnifying glass or white circle next to the Start menu.
- If you don’t see these icons, press ⊞ Win + S .
A list of search results will appear.
It should be near the top of the search results.
This opens the on-screen keyboard. You can use this keyboard by clicking the mouse (or tapping the touchscreen) on the key you want to type.

Method 3

Method 3 of 5:

It’s usually at the bottom-right corner of the screen. A menu will appear.
2
Click Show touch keyboard button . This adds a small keyboard icon to the area by the clock.
- If you have a lot of icons in this area, click the arrow to display the icons you can’t see.
This opens the touch keyboard. You can now use your touchscreen to type.

Method 4

Method 4 of 5:

1
Click the Search icon. It’s usually a magnifying glass or white circle next to the Start menu.
- If you don’t see these icons, press ⊞ Win + S .
A list of results will appear.
It should be the first match.
A list of languages will appear.
This downloads the language and adds it to the Languages list.
It’s under the “Languages” header. Some buttons will appear.
The keyboard for this language will download to the computer. When it’s finished installing, you’ll be prompted to restart the computer.
Click the

, click

, then click Restart . The computer will turn off and then turn back on.
Now when you need to switch languages, press and hold ⊞ Win and the Spacebar to bring up the language list, then click the language you want to use.

Method 5

Method 5 of 5:

If you plugged the keyboard in and it was not automatically detected, unplug the cable, then plug it back in.
If the keyboard is still not detected, type device manager into the search bar, then click Device Manager in the search results.
A context menu will appear.
This scans the computer for new keyboards. Once your keyboard is detected, the appropriate drivers will be installed.