Lost or forgot Windows password and can’t access your computer? As this is a very frequently asked question, the official answers are using a password-reset disk or start over by doing a clean installation. However, I don’t think those approaches apply well to your situations. In this tutorial we’ll explore the most effective ways to reset lost Windows 10, 8, 7 password on your computer.
Method 1: Reset Windows 10, 8, 7 Password with Command Prompt
If you can still log in to Windows using another admin account, PIN, picture password or fingerprint, it’s very easy to reset your Windows password from Command Prompt, without providing the original password. Follow these steps:
Step 1: Type cmd in the Cortana Search box. If you’re running Windows 7, click the Start button and type cmd in the Search box. Right-click on the Command Prompt from the search result, and then choose “Run as administrator”.
Step 2: Now, you can type the following command to reset your lost password. Replace user_name with the name of your Windows account, and new_password with your desired password.
net user user_name new_password
Step 3: After you’ve reset the password, you can then sign in to Windows with the new password!
Method 2: Reset Windows 10, 8, 7 Password with PCUnlocker
Locked out of your computer and couldn’t even get past Windows login screen? If you find yourself in this situation, try not to panic. Take a deep breath. You can still reset your forgotten Windows password using a bootable program – PCUnlocker.
PCUnlocker lets you boot your computer from a CD or USB drive, so you can access your Windows installation and remove the password offline. Here we’ll walk you through the easy steps to quickly reset lost Windows 10, 8, 7 password.
Step 1: To begin, you have to use another computer to create a PCUnlocker bootable CD (or USB drive) . Download the ISO image of PCUnlocker, and burn it to CD (or USB drive) using a burning software like ISO2Disc.
Step 2: Insert PCUnlocker Live CD (or USB drive) into the Windows 10 PC that you’re going to reset the password for. Start the computer and change the boot order in BIOS to boot from CD (or USB drive) first.
Step 3: After booting off CD, the built-in PCUnlocker program will open up. It will find the SAM database and list out all user accounts stored inside. If your computer has more than one operating system installed, you can click the drop-down list to choose the SAM file for each Windows installation.
Step 4: Choose the desired account you want to reset password for, and click on Reset Password button. Your password will be removed in seconds.
Step 5: Once you’ve completed the steps,, reboot the PC. Remove the CD (or unplug the USB drive). You can then access your Windows system without a password!
Conclusion
If you can’t get into your computer because you’ve lost Windows password, there are very few options to unlock your account. Try the above methods to reset your lost Windows 10, 8, 7 password before you decide to reinstall Windows from scratch.