Do you know how to recover the lost product key of Windows 11/10/8/7 on your computer? Don't worry if you have no technical computing skills. On this page, we'll present you with 5 practical methods that you just need to pick one method and follow the relative guide to find and recover lost Windows product key successfully on your own.
Don't worry if you lost the product key of the Windows operating system. On this page, we'll be presenting you with 5 methods and detailed steps to guide you to recover the lost product key on Windows 11/10/8/7 successfully on your own.
As we know that Windows product keys are widely used for Windows operating system activation or reactivation after reinstalling or migrating the OS. However, if you lost or failed to save the product key, how will you be able to find it on your computer?
Don't worry. Here, we'll list 5 reliable methods that you can follow anyone with the respective guide steps to recover lost product key on Windows 11/10/8/7 successfully. Let' see.
Note that the methods are listed from easy to complex. For the easiest methods, Method 1 and Method 2 are recommended. For a more complex Windows built-in method, you may try Method 3, Method 4, and Method 5.
Here the following, we'll take the latest Windows 11 as an example to show you the whole process. Let's go and follow the respective methods to start finding your missing or lost Windows product key now.
COA Sticker, known as Certificate of Authenticity Sticker, is widely used on computers that are shipped with Windows operating system by multiple computer manufacturers. The COA sticker verifies that the laptop or desktop computer is shipped with an authentic copy of Windows. Also, the stick is printed with a product key of the current computer operating system.
Therefore, if your computer is installed with the original Windows, you can directly check the Windows COA stick and find the missing product key:
Step 1. Check the back case or the keyboard area of your computer.
Currently, most COA stickers are pasted at the back of the computer.
Step 2. Find the lost product key of your Windows computer.
Usually, it's a serial of numbers printed under the Product Key area on the COA sticker.
Note that if you upgrade Windows OS, the original product key printed on the COA sticker may not work. And you can follow Method 2, 3, 4, 5 to find the current key on your computer.
The other easy way to recover lost product key on Windows 11/10/8/7, and even older Windows PC is turning to reliable product key finder software - EaseUS Key Finder for help.
With this product key finder, you can simply recover the lost product key on a Windows computer within one click. See what else you can do with this software:
Step 1. Click "Windows" tab under the Registry Key.
Step 2. Check Windows product key on the right side. Click "Copy" to paste. Or select other two options:
"Save" - Save to local as a PDF file.
"Print" - Click to print key file.
On some latest Windows computers, the product key of Windows OS is not printed on the COS sticker. Some product keys are stored in the PC's hardware like UEFI firmware or BIOS by the manufacture.
Users can directly use and even reinstall the same edition of Windows on the computer. In this case, you can try to run the Windows PowerShell command to find the product key. Here are the steps:
Step 1. Right-click the Windows icon at the start menu and select "Windows PowerShell".
Step 2. Type the command line into Windows PowerShell:
(Get-WmiObject -query 'select * from SoftwareLicensingService').OA3xOriginalProductKey
Step 3. Wait for Windows PowerShell to present you with the embedded license key of the current Windows OS on your PC.
The other similar way to PowerShell Command is to run the CMD command on a Windows computer and recover the lost product key. This is especially useful in finding product keys on old Windows 7 computers.
Of course, this also works on Windows 11/10/8 new computers. Let's see the detailed steps:
Step 1. Type cmd in the search box, right-click "Command Prompt" and select "Run as Administrator".
Step 2. Type the command line in the CMD window and hit Enter:
wmic path softwarelicensingservice get OA3xOriginalProductKey
Step 3. Wait for the prompt to find your product key on a computer.
The last effective way that you can try is to run Notepad with certain commands and save the file as a product key finder.
It will automatically find the product key of your current OS. Here are the steps:
Step 1. Create a new notepad and paste the following content into the notepad:
Set WshShell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
MsgBox ConvertToKey(WshShell.RegRead("HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\DigitalProductId"))
Function ConvertToKey(Key)
Const KeyOffset = 52
i = 28
Chars = "BCDFGHJKMPQRTVWXY2346789"
Do
Cur = 0
x = 14
Do
Cur = Cur * 256
Cur = Key(x + KeyOffset) + Cur
Key(x + KeyOffset) = (Cur \ 24) And 255
Cur = Cur Mod 24
x = x -1
Loop While x >= 0
i = i -1
KeyOutput = Mid(Chars, Cur + 1, 1) & KeyOutput
If (((29 - i) Mod 6) = 0) And (i <> -1) Then
i = i -1
KeyOutput = "-" & KeyOutput
End If
Loop While i >= 0
ConvertToKey = KeyOutput
End Function
Step 2. Go to File > Save As > Change the "Save as type" to "All Files".
Step 3. Name the notepad as productkey.vbs.
Step 4. Save the file to your desktop.
Step 5. Double-click the productkey file and you'll be showing the product of your current operating system.
On this page, we included 5 methods that can help you recover lost product keys on Windows 11, 10, 8, 7 and even older versions of Windows.
Among the 5 methods, COA sticker and 1-click Product Key Finder - EaseUS Key Finder are the two easiest tricks that you can apply to recover a lost Windows serial key.
The other three methods, though a bit more complex, are still reliable that you can follow carefully to find the missing key. As long as the Windows product key is important, go and follow to find it now.
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