How to Set PowerShell Execution Policy on Windows Systems

By default, PowerShell prevents the execution of scripts on Windows systems. The PowerShell execution policy actively controls the conditions under which it loads configuration files and runs scripts as a security feature. In this guide, you will learn how to set Execution Policy via Windows PowerShell. Please see How to install and update PowerShell version 7 on Windows and Linux, and how to determine the execution policy configured on Windows PC.

Note: This feature helps prevent the execution of malicious scripts. In order to run and execute scripts, one of the following values must be taken into consideration.

See this guide on how this is done “how to set the PowerShell Execution Policy via the Windows Registry settings“.

PowerShell Policies

Below are the various values of policies that exist.

AllSigned: This runs the only script that is signed by a trusted publisher only.
ByPass: Configured to permit a certain script to run
Default: By default, the Execution Policy is set to restricted for Windows devices and for server, it is RemoteSigned.
RemoteSgned: You must sign the script with a trusted publisher before allowing it to run. Scripts run from the local computer don’t need to be signed. There are no prompts when you attempt to run a script.
Restricted: In this mode, no PowerShell script is allowed to run on the device.
Unrestricted: In this mode, the device runs these scripts regardless of where they are created or downloaded from.
Undefined (No execution policy): This value does not have the execution policy set. The effective execution policy is Restricted, which is the default execution policy.

PowerShell Scope

This sets the scope on which the execution policy applies. You can run and set the execution policy at various scopes, as shown below.

The effective execution policy is determined by the order of precedence as follows. See the screenshot below for more information.

MachinePolicy
LocalMachine
Process
UserPolicy
CurrentUser

Open PowerShell. This is usually advisable to be run in Admin mode. Type the following command and press the Enter key

Get-ExecutionPolicy -List

To view the current policy, use

Get-ExecutionPolicy

Windows PowerShell interface displaying the command 'Get-ExecutionPolicy -list' with the output showing undefined execution policies for different scopes.

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Set PowerShell Execution Policy

The Set-ExecutionPolicy cmdlet changes PowerShell execution policies for Windows computers. Here is how to see the PowerShell Execution Policy.

Type the following command and press the Enter key

Set-ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted

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Note: When you hit enter after the prompt, you can select any of the options as follow; by selecting yes, or Yes to All or No. When you hit enter without choosing a value, the No (Nien switch) is selected automatically and the script will not run. Pay close attention to the script below as the position was taken by default and this was set to unrestricted.

Command line interface showing the PowerShell command 'Set-ExecutionPolicy' with prompts for changing execution policy to 'unrestricted'.

Note: Set-ExecutionPolicy doesn’t change the MachinePolicy and UserPolicy scopes because they are set by Group Policies.

The Set-ExecutionPolicy doesn’t override a Group Policy, even if the user preference is more restrictive than the policy.

Here is an example of how to set an execution policy is set to unrestricted. This will permit all scripts to be run on the device.

Screenshot of a Windows PowerShell window displaying a prompt to change the execution policy to 'Unrestricted'. The message warns of potential security risks and presents options to the user.

An example here which is also a best practice measure is to allow the script testwsus.ps1 to run only in order not to set the global execution policy to unrestricted as shown below.

Set-ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .\testwsus.ps1

If you don´t want to set this parameter for the entire system you are able to start a PowerShell session in unrestricted mode.

set-executionpolicy unrestricted -command .\testwsus.ps1

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Set PowerShell Execution Policy via a script

Below is a PowerShell script that is capable of changing the execution policy. Kindly save it in the following format and run it as an administrator.

With the script below, we can define the execution policy of our choice. The script will then check if it matches the current execution policy. If not, the execution policy will be changed.

			
$Policy = "RemoteSigned" 
If ((Get-ExecutionPolicy) -ne $Policy) {    
 Set-ExecutionPolicy $Policy -Force   
Exit
}

		

I hope you found this blog post helpful on how to set Execution Policy via Windows PowerShell. If you have any questions, please let me know in the comment session.