Windows 8.1 shows you a list of all user accounts available on your PC on the logon screen. You can click the user avatar, enter the password if it is necessary, and login using the provided credentials. Did you know that it is possible to hide a specific user from this list, so the account becomes hidden. Nobody will be able to see that you have such a user account. This can be done with a simple registry tweak, which I will cover in this article.
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Before you proceed, you need to know the following: if you hide all your accounts you will not be able to sign in until you enable the Administrator account using the Windows installation DVD or recovery disc.
Alternatively, you might want to make Windows 10 ask for user name and password during log on.
To hide a specific user from the login screen, you need to do the following steps:
- Right click This PC icon in File Explorer and choose Manage from its context menu.
- Under Computer Management -> System Tools, select the item Local Users and Groups. Double click Users.
Note the value of the first column, "Name". By default, Windows shows the "Full Name" value on the login screen, but we need the actual login name. - Next, open Registry Editor.
- Go to the following Registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon
Tip: You can access any desired Registry key with one click.
- Create a new subkey here called SpecialAccounts.
- Now create a key named UserList under the SpecialAccounts key. You should get the following path:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\SpecialAccounts\UserList
- Create a new DWORD value in the UserList subkey. Use the login name which you noted earlier in Local Users and Groups as the name of the new value you just created. Do not modify its default value, leave it at 0. You should get something like this:
This is all you need to do. If you done everything properly, the account will disappear from the logon screen.
Before:
After:
To login into the hidden account, you need to make Windows to ask for user name and password during log on.
To show that account again, just delete the DWORD value you created earlier under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\SpecialAccounts\UserList Registry key.
That's it.
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So, If i make one of these hidden accounts, how do i log-in to it from the log-in screen while it’s still hidden? Or do i have to unhide it through the registry to be able to access it again. I would love to be able to log-in to a hidden account via this method.
AFAIK you will be able to log in only if your PC is in AD/domain. Then it offers to enter the user name manually.
Okay, so it won’t work on a windows 8 home edition then?
Yeah, until you unhide the hidden account again from the another ‘visible’ account.
Back in the XP-era you could press Ctrl+Alt+Del _twice_ on the Welcome Screen to get the old 2000 GINA logon screen where you could type the username. I have not tried this on NT6 so I don’t know if it still works…
unfortunately, it stop working in Vista and above
I followed your steps into successfully hiding my original user. HOWEVER, I can’t unhide it because my current user account doesn’t have administrator priviledges to edit the registry back to its original place. Is there any way around this? I can’t even install software on this new user because it’s not an admnistrator account and I can’t set it to an admnistrator account without having access to my hidden account either. I think this is something you should’ve warned about in your original post.
But i warned!
1. Boot from any Windows Vista/7/8/10 bootable media
2. When you will see the Install button, press Shift+F10 to open a new cmd.exe instance.
3. Type regedit and then select HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE.
4. Click File – Mount Hive. Select c:\windows\system32\config\system from your hard drive.
5. Delete values for the hidden account.
6. Start OS normally.
Hi Sergey,
I have the same problem as Peter Rabbit.
I didn’t realize that if we hide all of our “admin” accounts, that’s what you meant by hide all of your accounts.
Nevertheless, I have a Windows 8.1 Pro machine and have BitLocker enabled.
Do Steps 1 and 2 change for me?
Is it even possible to recover with BitLocker enbaled?
Regards,
Robert
You can navigate to C:\Windows and shift key + right click on regedit.exe. This will bring up an option ‘Run as different user’ and you can log in with admin credentials to get into the registry and unhide the admin account.
Is it possible to do Step 1 (Boot from any Windows Vista/7/8/10 bootable media) without a disc?
I have Windows 8.1 Pro
Well, you can create the recovery flash drive or CD and use it, using the built-in Win8.1 tool. Type recovery on the Start screen.
I also have BitLocker set up, do i need to do anything differently to bring back the admin account?
I have not deal with Bitlocker, so my advices can be weird.
This is very neat, but is there a way to hide it only from the Start screen? This also hides it from the UAC dialog when a standard user requires admin credentials… and well, that’s inconvenient, to say the least.
Also, you could add as an easier workaround for those who locked themselves out hiding all admin accounts by mistake, to follow these easy steps:
1. Open a CMD window.
2. Type: runas /user:\ cmd
3. It will prompt for the admin password, provide it
4. The CMD window will have now admin rights, you can run regedit from there and fix the issue.
If you create the UserList registry key using an ordinary account rather than an adminsitartor account the key seems to allow ‘Users’ full permission on it.
You can create a text file using notepad like this :
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\SpecialAccounts\UserList]
(Note the minus sign before ‘HKEY’.) Save as MakeHiddenAccountsVisible.reg and then double click this file to merge it into the registry and make your accounts visible after the next restart.
Thank you for your useful comment.
I have just done it on windows 10. It hide user on login screen, but we go to C:/users/ and we will see all user list. Is there anyway to hide that username from listing folder on C://Users ?
There is no way to hide it from there, unless you move the profile to some other location.
Deserves an article here.
The hidden username trick during logon allow to use a hidden account:
httр://www.sеvеnfоrums.соm/tutоriаls/61650-lоg-usеr-nаmе-pаsswоrd.html
> HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon <
This key does not open the registry in windows 10, it says –
Make sure you typed the name correctly
who says?
“HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon” is a registry path – have you tried opening up the specific folders – once by one – its usually easier and faster to go to a specific registry container.