How to query a list of installed programs in Windows via Windows Settings, Control Panel, WMIC, PowerShell and Windows Registry

Here are the various methods if you wish to query the list of installed applications on Windows 10 or windows Server.

1: Via Windows Settings: This is the easiest way to view the list of installed applications in Windows
– Navigate to Windows Settings as shown below or use press Windows key + I to open settings
-Click on Apps

Next, click on the installed programs as shown below
– There you should be able to see the list of installed programs in Windows

2: Via the Control Panel: This method is similar to using Windows Settings but a bit old fashioned.
– In the search box on the taskbar, type control panel,
– Click on Control Panel as shown below

Next, click on programs

Now, click on Programs and Features

Below is a list of installed programs via the Windows Control Panel.

3: Via Windows Management Instrumentation Command-line (WMIC): The WMIC is a command-line and scripting interface that simplifies the use of Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) and systems managed through WMI. Below are the various steps to make this work. Run the command below with your desired name which you wish to have the installed programs listed in. In my case, this is “InstalledProgramsonmyPC.txt“.

wmic /OUTPUT:InstalledProgramsonmyPC.txt product get name

Alternatively, you can execute the wmic this way as shown below
– Type “wmic” and press Enter.

At the “wmic:root\cli>” prompt, type the following command:

/node:EnterComputerNameHere product get name, version, vendor

4: Via PowerShell: Run the following code in order to query the registry for installed programs

$loc = Get-ChildItem HKLM:\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall

$names = $loc |foreach-object {Get-ItemProperty $_.PsPath}

foreach ($name in $names)
{
    Write-Host $name.Displayname
}

5: Via the Windows Registry: Alternatively you could use the command below to view the list of installed programs to query the registry. This will query the registry for all programs that are installed with the MSI installer on the system and place the results in a text file.
– Use the command below via the Command Prompt or PowerShell

reg query HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall >> ListofInstalledPrograms.txt

I hope you found this blog post helpful. If you have any questions, please let me know in the comment session.

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