Microsoft wants Windows 11 installs to use a Microsoft Account — confirms removal of popular setup bypass

Microsoft has confirmed that it's removing a popular command line that allowed users to bypass connecting to the internet and signing into a Microsoft Account when setting up a new Windows 11 PC.

When Windows 11 version 22H2 launched, Microsoft made it so that both Windows 11 Home and Windows 11 Pro required an internet connection and Microsoft Account during setup, but users quickly discovered workarounds.

The most popular workaround is the command "bypassnro", which when entered into a command prompt while in the Windows setup experience would enable the ability to skip connecting to the internet, therefore bypassing the Microsoft Account requirement.

As noted in the latest Windows 11 preview build, the company is removing the command to "ensure that all users exit setup with internet connectivity and a Microsoft Account."

This change will be controversial among Windows users who don't want to use a Microsoft Account on Windows 11. Going forward, there will be no easy way to bypass this requirement on a new Windows 11 PC.

There are still ways to bypass these requirements, including setting up an unattend.xml installation, which bypasses the setup phase, but this requires a lot more work and includes creating a new Windows installation image from scratch.

Currently, it's also possible to manually re-add the bypassnro command to your system by typing the following into a command prompt: "reg add HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\OOBE /v BypassNRO /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f shutdown /r /t 0"

It's unclear how long this will work, however, as Microsoft may soon remove the registry value that enabled the command to work to fully prevent users from using this method to bypass signing in with a Microsoft Account.

Windows 11 PCs that have already been set up without a Microsoft Account will be unaffected. This change only affects the Windows 11 install and setup experience, where the OS requires an internet connection and a Microsoft Account to progress.

The removal of the bypassnro command is now in testing with the latest Windows 11 beta build, which means it will likely roll out to the production versions of Windows 11 in the coming weeks.