If you lost your Windows 10 product key, use one of the methods shown in this post to find Windows 10 serial number or license key.
When you want to reinstall Windows 10 or to get technical support from OEMs, you need to know the computer serial number. Generally, if you bought a desktop or laptop from OEMs like Dell, HP, etc, you will find it on a sticker on the machine itself. However, that may not be the case for other machines. In those cases, you need a different way to find Windows 10 serial key. The problem is, Windows 10 doesn’t display the serial key directly for security reasons. Rather, it shows the product key which is completely different from the license key.
The good thing is, there is always a way. When needed, use one of the below methods to quickly find the serial number of a Windows computer.
Jump to:
- How to find Windows Serial Number from Command Prompt
- How to find Windows License Key from PowerShell
- How to Export Serial Number to Text File
Important Note: If you’ve upgraded from Windows 7 or 8 to Windows 10 for free or if Windows 10 is activated using the digital license, you will not have any license key. To be precise, you will have a generic Windows 10 serial number. This is because your Windows 10 machine is linked to your Microsoft account.
How to find Windows Serial Number from Command Prompt
With a single line command, you can find Windows 10 license key in the Command Prompt. Here’re the steps you should follow.
- Open the Start menu by pressing the “Windows Key” on your keyboard.
- Type “Command Prompt” in the Start menu search bar.
- Right-click on Command Prompt and select the “Run as administrator” option.
- After opening the Command Prompt window, execute the below command.
wmic bios get serialnumber
- As soon as you execute the command, the Command Prompt window will show the serial number.
- To copy the serial number, select the serial key with your mouse and right-click to copy it.
- Once copied, you can paste it anywhere you want.
That is all. It is that simple to get Windows 10 serial number in Command Prompt.
How to find Windows License Key from PowerShell
PowerShell has a dedicated command to find the serial key in Windows 10. Just execute the command and you will have the license key instantly. These are the steps you should follow.
- Press the Windows key to open the Start menu.
- Type “PowerShell“, right-click on it and select “Run as administrator“.
- After opening the PowerShell as admin, execute the command below.
Get-WmiObject win32_bios | Format-List SerialNumber
- As soon as you execute the command, PowerShell will show the Windows 10 serial number.
- Select the serial key and right-click to copy it to the clipboard.
- Once copied, you can paste it anywhere you want.
That is all. As you can see, just as with Command Prompt, PowerShell provides a simple command to get the Windows 10 license key.
How to Export Serial Number to Text File
You can export the Windows 10 serial number to a text file from the Command Prompt. Here’s how.
- Open the Command Prompt as admin.
- After opening the command window, execute the below command.
wmic bios get SerialNumber > C:\Win10SerialNumber.txt - The above will save the serial number is a text file called “Win10SerialNumber.txt” in the root of the C drive.
- If you want to, you can change the file name and destination by modifying the second part of the command.
That is all.
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If the above method did not work for any reason, you can also get Windows 10 license key from the registry. However, the process is much more involved but easy to follow.
I hope that helps. If you are stuck or need some help, comment below and I will try to help as much as possible.