Stop upgrade to Windows 11

That was Windows 8 that we were trying to stop/not 10 but I know where you're coming from.
MS thinks they are experts in the field of forcing the world onto a new OS, anything to maintain the revenue stream
They did it by pushing Me on Win 98 2nd edition installations that were working fine. The screwed with us to drop XP and upgrade our hardware for Vista, That darn OS didn't even work until the first Service Pack, They totally outdid themselves for the Windows 8 upgrade by breaking Windows Update on 7. Yeah, they can be real stinkers

I don't have my notes on win7 or XP. But on Win10 this will stop updates entirely:

Click Start and type regedit and click the top search result to launch the Registry Editor.

In the registry editor, navigate to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows

Right-click the Windows key and select New.

From the options choose Key.

Name the key WindowsUpdate and press Enter.

You'll now see the WindowsUpdate key listed.

Right click the new WindowsUpdate key you just made.

As before, Select New then Key.

Name this key AU and press Enter.

Right-click the AU key you just made and select New, then DWORD (32-bit).

Name this new key NoAutoUpdate and press Enter.

Double-click the NoAutoUpdate key you just made.

In the pop-up, change the value from 0 to 1.

Click OK to accept the changes. Close the editor. Restart the computer, and it will no longer look for updates.

The problem I've been trying to resolve is a bit different because I want Win10 updates. What I found however is that by doing the above it appears to reset whatever mind-boggling nonsense creates this loop. Then going back to delete it removes the block on updates and it now only seeks Win10 updates. It still recommends the upgrade but that can be ignored.

Of course, I'm sure that in due time they will change something that makes this no longer work. But for the moment it does.

No. Windows 10 isnt going anywhere, its brand new! Stay away from 11!

ok found more answers and providing some links

To update the domain with the latest Admin templates so the options are there for the GPO

(Hard to see but all the screen shots for how to do it via GPO was using the Local GPO not the domain one)

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/troubleshoot/windows-client/group-policy/create-and-manage-central-store

also got info from here http://woshub.com/install-update-group-policy-administrative-templates-admx/

Now from this site they mention one more Reg key (I have not seen on other sites) that matches up with the GPO "ProductVersion" https://www.pdq.com/blog/how-to-block-the-windows-11-upgrade/

I hope this helps out. I have not verified that this actually stops the update or not still testing but wanted to share info that I found.

You could very well be correct. That was my interpretation of the MajorGeeks' article and information I have read in the past about Windows 10 and updates. I hope someone with a definitive knowledge of this would jump in here.