Windows 10 tip: Find your PC's original product key
If you've purchased a new PC
with Windows pre-installed in the past few years, chances are it has a product key
embedded in its BIOS. With a little PowerShell wizardry, you can find that
well-hidden key and learn more about your current licensing status.
If you've purchased a new PC with Windows pre-installed in the past few
years, you might have noticed a few changes on the outside of the device.
The biggest change is the absence of a product key, which was included
on the holographic Certificate of Authenticity (COA) sticker with PCs that came
pre-installed with Windows 7 or earlier versions.
Beginning with Windows 8, that information is no longer on a COA but is
instead embedded in the BIOS. If you re-install the same version of Windows
that came with your PC, it should activate automatically.
If you want to record that product key so that you can restore Windows
later, it's easy enough to do. Open a PowerShell window and issue this command:
(Get-WmiObject -query 'select * from
SoftwareLicensingService').OA3xOriginalProductKey
If you see no output, that means your system does not include the
Windows key in the BIOS, as is often the case with home-built PCs, devices
built by a System Builder OEM, or those that were originally sold with a
Windows 10 license.
Network administrators who manage licensing using Key Management
Services can get details about PCs on the network using a different set of
options for the same PowerShell command. To view all details about a machine's
current licensing status, use this command:
Get-WMIObject -Class SoftwareLicensingService |
Select-Object -Property *
(Be sure to include the asterisk at the end of that command.)
To save the key, click in the PowerShell window, drag the mouse pointer
across the entire 25-character key, and then right-click. Although nothing
appears to happen, your selection has actually been copied to the Clipboard.
Paste it into a text file and save it in a safe place.
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