Windows Hello is a more personal, more secure way to get instant access to your Windows 11 devices using a PIN, facial recognition, or fingerprint. You’ll need to set up a PIN as part of setting up fingerprint or facial recognition sign-in, but you can also sign in with just your PIN.
These options help make it easier and safer to sign into your PC because your PIN is only associated with one device and it’s backed up for recovery with your Microsoft account.
If your Windows 11 device has a built-in fingerprint sensor or connected fingerprint reader, you can set up the fingerprint recognition sign-in option.
After you set up fingerprint recognition, you can set up and add another finger as wanted to use to sign in.
This tutorial will show you how to remove the Windows Hello fingerprint recognition sign-in option from your account in Windows 11.
Windows Hello is a more personal, more secure way to get instant access to your Windows 11 devices using a PIN, facial recognition, or fingerprint. You’ll need to set up a PIN as part of setting up fingerprint or facial recognition sign-in, but you can also sign in with just your PIN.
These options help make it easier and safer to sign into your PC because your PIN is only associated with one device and it’s backed up for recovery with your Microsoft account.
If your Windows 11 device has a built-in fingerprint sensor or connected fingerprint reader, you can set up the fingerprint recognition sign-in option.
After you set up fingerprint recognition, you can set up and add another finger as wanted to use to sign in.
This tutorial will show you how to set up another finger to add to the Windows Hello fingerprint recognition sign-in option for your account in Windows 11.
Windows Hello is a more personal, more secure way to get instant access to your Windows 11 devices using a PIN, facial recognition, or fingerprint. You’ll need to set up a PIN as part of setting up fingerprint or facial recognition sign-in, but you can also sign in with just your PIN.
These options help make it easier and safer to sign into your PC because your PIN is only associated with one device and it’s backed up for recovery with your Microsoft account.
If your Windows 11 device has a built-in fingerprint sensor or connected fingerprint reader, you can set up the fingerprint recognition sign-in option.
This tutorial will show you how to set up the Windows Hello fingerprint recognition sign-in option for your account in Windows 11.
Windows Hello is a more personal, more secure way to get instant access to your Windows 11 devices using a PIN, facial recognition, or fingerprint. You’ll need to set up a PIN as part of setting up fingerprint or facial recognition sign-in, but you can also sign in with just your PIN.
These options help make it easier and safer to sign into your PC because your PIN is only associated with one device and it’s backed up for recovery with your Microsoft account.
You can set up facial recognition sign-in with your PC’s infrared camera or an external infrared camera.
After you set up your face with Windows Hello, you can turn on or off to automatically unlock the lock screen when Windows Hello recognizes your face to sign in.
This tutorial will show you how to turn on or off automatically dismiss the lock screen if Windows Hello recognizes your face in Windows 11.
Windows Hello is a more personal, more secure way to get instant access to your Windows 11 devices using a PIN, facial recognition, or fingerprint. You’ll need to set up a PIN as part of setting up fingerprint or facial recognition sign-in, but you can also sign in with just your PIN.
These options help make it easier and safer to sign into your PC because your PIN is only associated with one device and it’s backed up for recovery with your Microsoft account.
You can set up facial recognition sign-in with your PC’s infrared camera or an external infrared camera.
If Windows Hello can’t always recognize your face (ex: with and without glasses, different lighting conditions, or face angles) while trying to unlock and sign in to your PC, then you may need to improve recognition for your face to help.
This tutorial will show you how to improve recognition for the Windows Hello facial recognition sign-in option for your account in Windows 11.
Windows Hello is a more personal, more secure way to get instant access to your Windows 11 devices using a PIN, facial recognition, or fingerprint. You’ll need to set up a PIN as part of setting up fingerprint or facial recognition sign-in, but you can also sign in with just your PIN.
These options help make it easier and safer to sign into your PC because your PIN is only associated with one device and it’s backed up for recovery with your Microsoft account.
You can set up facial recognition sign-in with your PC’s infrared camera or an external infrared camera.
This tutorial will show you how to set up the Windows Hello facial recognition sign-in option for your account in Windows 11.
You can speed up the Windows sign-in process by turning on Use my sign in info to automatically finish setting up after an update to automatically sign in and set up your PC after an update or restart. Windows will then lock your device to help keep your account and personal info safe.
During a Windows Update, there are user specific processes that must happen for the update to be complete. These processes require the user to be logged in to their device. On the first login after an update has been initiated, users must wait until these user specific processes are complete before they can start using their device.
When Windows Update initiates an automatic reboot, ARSO (Winlogon automatic restart sign-on) extracts the currently logged in user’s derived credentials, persists it to disk, and configures Autologon for the user. Windows Update running as system with TCB privilege will initiate the RPC call to do this.
After the final Windows Update reboot, the user will automatically be logged in via the Autologon mechanism, and the user’s session is rehydrated with the persisted secrets. Additionally, the device is locked to protect the user’s session. The locking will be initiated via Winlogon whereas the credential management is done by the Local Security Authority (LSA). Upon a successful ARSO configuration and login, the saved credentials are immediately deleted from disk.
By automatically logging in and locking the user on the console, Windows Update can complete the user specific processes before the user returns to the device. In this way, the user can immediately start using their device.
This tutorial will show you how to enable or disable automatically sign in and lock last user after an update or restart in Windows 11.
Windows Hello is a more personal, more secure way to get instant access to your Windows 11 devices using a PIN, facial recognition, or fingerprint. You’ll need to set up a PIN as part of setting up fingerprint or facial recognition sign-in, but you can also sign in with just your PIN.
These options help make it easier and safer to sign into your PC because your PIN is only associated with one device and it’s backed up for recovery with your Microsoft account.
If you forgot your PIN, you can reset the PIN if you know your account’s password.
This tutorial will show you how to enable or disable reset PIN at sign-in for all Microsoft accounts in Windows 11.
Windows Hello is a more personal, more secure way to get instant access to your Windows 11 devices using a PIN, facial recognition, or fingerprint. You’ll need to set up a PIN as part of setting up fingerprint or facial recognition sign-in, but you can also sign in with just your PIN.
These options help make it easier and safer to sign into your PC because your PIN is only associated with one device and it’s backed up for recovery with your Microsoft account.
This tutorial will show you how to change the PIN for your account in Windows 11.
Windows Hello is a more personal, more secure way to get instant access to your Windows 11 devices using a PIN, facial recognition, or fingerprint. You’ll need to set up a PIN as part of setting up fingerprint or facial recognition sign-in, but you can also sign in with just your PIN.
These options help make it easier and safer to sign into your PC because your PIN is only associated with one device and it’s backed up for recovery with your Microsoft account.
If you forgot your PIN, you can reset the PIN if you know your account’s password.
This tutorial will show you how to reset the PIN for your account in Windows 11.
Windows Hello is a more personal, more secure way to get instant access to your Windows 11 devices using a PIN, facial recognition, or fingerprint. You’ll need to set up a PIN as part of setting up fingerprint or facial recognition sign-in, but you can also sign in with just your PIN.
These options help make it easier and safer to sign into your PC because your PIN is only associated with one device and it’s backed up for recovery with your Microsoft account.
This tutorial will show you how to add the Windows Hello PIN sign-in option from your account in Windows 11.
Windows Hello is a more personal, more secure way to get instant access to your Windows 11 devices using a PIN, facial recognition, or fingerprint. You’ll need to set up a PIN as part of setting up fingerprint or facial recognition sign-in, but you can also sign in with just your PIN.
These options help make it easier and safer to sign into your PC because your PIN is only associated with one device and it’s backed up for recovery with your Microsoft account.
How is a PIN different from (and better than) a password? On the surface, a PIN looks much like a password. A PIN can be a set of numbers, but enterprise policy might allow complex PINs that include special characters and letters, both upper-case and lower-case. Something like t758A! could be an account password or a complex Hello PIN. It isn’t the structure of a PIN (length, complexity) that makes it better than a password, it’s how it works.
You can remove the PIN sign-in option from your account if wanted.
This tutorial will show you how to remove the Windows Hello PIN sign-in option from your account in Windows 11.
The lock screen is the screen you see at startup and when you lock (Win+L) the PC. You will need to dismiss the lock screen to to see the sign-in screen and sign in to Windows.
By default, the sign-in screen background image has an acrylic blur effect as part of Windows 11 transparency effects.
If you would prefer to have a clear sign-in screen background image without affecting other transparency effects for users, you can enable the Show clear logon background group policy.
This tutorial will show you how to enable or disable the acrylic blur effect on the sign-in screen background image for all users in Windows 11.
To help secure your PC, Windows requires users to sign in on wakeup from sleep, hibernate, or resuming from Modern Standby (if supported) by default.
This tutorial will show you how to enable or disable to require sign-in on wakeup from sleep, hibernate, or Modern Standby for all users in Windows 11.
By default at the startup of Windows 11, you need to dismiss the Lock screen, select the account you want to sign in to on the Sign-in screen, and sign in to the account using the selected sign-in option (ex: password, picture password, PIN (Windows Hello), facial recognition (Windows Hello), or fingerprint (Windows Hello).
This tutorial will show you how to enable or disable automatically sign in to a specific account at startup in Windows 11.
You can keep your device even more secure by removing passwords when signing in to Windows 11 with Microsoft accounts on your device. All the places on your device where you use your Microsoft account and password (even your apps and browsers) will automatically switch to modern multifactor authentication with Windows Hello Face, Fingerprint, or PIN.
This tutorial will show you how to turn on or off only allow Windows Hello sign-in for Microsoft accounts for passwordless sign-in on your Windows 11 device.
Autofill in Microsoft Edge helps you be more productive by letting you save passwords. Passwords are only saved with your explicit permission for each password. When you visit a website that requires you to sign in, Microsoft Edge will ask if you want your user name and password remembered for the site. The next time you visit the site, Microsoft Edge will automatically finish filling in your saved account info by default.
By default, Microsoft Edge won’t ask you for permission each time before automatically signing in to a website.
Starting with Microsoft Edge Dev and Canary, you can select to have Microsoft Edge ask you to enter your Windows 10 device account password before auto-filling your password on a website.
This tutorial will show you how to enable or disable automatically sign in to a website or auto-filling your password on a website in Microsoft Edge.
The DelayLockInterval time in Windows 10 is the amount of time after the display turns off before you are required to sign in when you move the mouse, touch the touchpad or touchscreen, click a mouse or touchpad button, or press a key to turn the display back on without the computer going to sleep or hibernate first.
When the display turns off automatically on Windows 10 desktop and laptop type devices, you are not required to sign in by default when you move the mouse, touch the touchpad or touchscreen, click a mouse or touchpad button, or press a key to turn the display back on. You can continue where you left off when the display turns back on without being required to sign in first.
When the display turns off automatically on Windows 10 2-in-1, convertible, Surface, and tablet type devices, you are required to sign in by default when you move the mouse, touch the touchpad or touchscreen, click a mouse or touchpad button, or press a key to turn the display back on. You will be required to dismiss the lock screen, and sign in to Windows 10 before being able to continue where you left off when the display turns back on.
If you have a short turn off display time set and are constantly having to move the mouse, touch the touchpad or touchscreen, click a mouse or touchpad button, or press a key to turn the display back on, it can be a real pain to also be required to sign in each time if you have a short DelayLockInterval time delay.
If you are not required to sign in after the display turns off, you may want to enable and set a specified DelayLockInterval time delay to automatically require sign in for better security.
If you like, you can enable and change or disable this DelayLockInterval time delay depending on what you want for your situation.
This tutorial will show you how to enable or disable require sign-in after a specified time when the display turns off for your account in Windows 10.
If you chose Enabled in the Sign-in and lock last interactive user automatically after a restart policy, you can configure its settings through the Configure the mode of automatically signing in and locking last interactive user after a restart or cold boot policy​.
If you chose Disabled in the Sign-in and lock last interactive user automatically after a restart policy, then automatic sign on will not occur and the Configure the mode of automatically signing in and locking last interactive user after a restart or cold boot policy does not need to be configured.
The Configure the mode of automatically signing in and locking last interactive user after a restart or cold boot policy setting controls the configuration under which an automatic restart and sign on and lock occurs after a restart or cold boot.
This tutorial will show you how to configure the mode of automatically signing in and locking last interactive user after a restart or cold boot for all users in Windows 10.
Windows 10 makes it easy to add the accounts you use for your apps in one place in Settings > Accounts > Email & accounts so you can sign in to your favorite apps easier and faster.
When you add an account in this central location in Settings, that account will be a listed account available to select to sign in to an app with. This can be handy so you no longer have to manually add the account for each individual app you want to sign in to with it.
This tutorial will show you how to add and remove accounts used by other apps to sign in with for your account in Windows 10.