Opening up Windows Terminal with elevated privileges, from within Windows Terminal

Question

There are plenty of questions here which asks how to elevate priviliges from powershell, and almost all of them recommend this command:

Start-Process -Verb RunAs powershell.exe .....

(or pwsh.exe for Powershell Core)

And this works, it opens up a new Powershell window with elevated privileges, after having gone through a UAC block to verify access.

However, while I'm using Powershell, I'm doing it inside Windows Terminal, the new terminal application for Windows 10, and I would like to open a new instance of Windows Terminal with elevated privileges, not just a Powershell window.

So I tried these commands:

Start-Process -Verb RunAs wt
Start-Process -Verb RunAs wt.exe
Start-Process -Verb RunAs (Get-Command wt)
Start-Process -Verb RunAs "C:\Users\lasse\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps\wt.exe"

They all fail with:

Start-Process: This command cannot be run due to the error: The file cannot be accessed by the system..

I'm assuming this has something to do with where the executable is located, within my profile, but if I right-click the Windows Terminal icon I have on my task bar and choose to run it as administrator, it opens up just fine. This is what I want to duplicate.

So is there a way for me to modify either the commands I tried above, or change some access setting that would make this work?

For my specific instance, I simply want to make it simpler to pop open an admin terminal, I don't need a way to elevate arbitrary commands, then I will happily use the commands I have already shown here.

Answer 1

Currently you cannot open an elevated wt.exe session from the command line without workarounds. Workarounds include using gsudo, Using Task Scheduler (I tested this one and it works but you need to use the full path to wt.exe and you can skip the shortcut creation step) OR if you are ok with a keyboard shortcut, the simplest way; using a keyboard shortcut to run Windows Terminal as Admin from the taskbar.

For your use case:

For my specific instance, I simply want to make it simpler to pop open an admin terminal, I don't need a way to elevate arbitrary commands, then I will happily use the commands I have already shown here.

The simplest approach will work:

Pin Windows Terminal as the first item on the task bar. Then hit Win+Ctrl+Shift+1 to open it as admin.

If you really must launch Windows Terminal from the command line from within Windows Terminal then create a task in the Task Scheduler:

1. Give the task a name, check 'Run with highest privileges'.
2. Choose the 'Actions' tab, click 'New', select 'Start a program' as the action. Put the full path to wt.exe in the 'Program/script field'. Click OK. Click OK again.
3. Click 'Conditions' tab, uncheck "Start the task only if the computer is on AC power".
4. Click 'Settings' tab, make sure "Allow task to be run on demand" is checked and uncheck "Stop the task if running for longer than".
5. Finally in your shell (Powershell), launch an elevated Windows Terminal session by running the command: schtasks /run /TN "TASK_NAME" where TASK_NAME is the name you gave the task in step 1.

Answer 2

Try this:

powershell "Start-Process -Verb RunAs cmd.exe '/c start wt.exe'"

Also check out these links:

WT.exe command line arguments: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/terminal/command-line-arguments?tabs=windows

Article about adding Open Windows Terminal Command Prompt to the context menu in Explorer (includes Admin): https://dkcool.tailnet.net/2020/07/add-open-windows-terminal-command-prompt-to-the-explorer-context-menu-in-windows-10/

Article about adding Open Admin Command Prompt to the context menu in Explorer: https://dkcool.tailnet.net/2019/05/add-open-admin-command-prompt-to-the-explorer-context-menu-in-windows-10/

Answer 3

Not a direct answer but another option if you have PowerToys is to:

1. Alt + Space, type Terminal,
2. Select Run as Administrator (or Ctrl + Shift + Enter)

You can install PowerToys using WinGet

Answer 4

With recent releases, this issue appears to be fixed. It works now, doing exactly as you originally tried and failed (Start-Process -verb RunAs wt). I would recommend trying again now with the latest releases (at least Windows Terminal, and perhaps PowerShell as well).

No need for workarounds anymore!!

Answer 5

Windows Terminal has a feature to automatically run as administrator in the preview; no need for workarounds now.

Answer 6

Pin to the Taskbar and hold Ctrl + Shift while left clicking on the Windows Terminal icon.

Answer 7

In my particular case I also need Windows Terminal opened as administrator all the time. This is what I did, run "where wt" to display the path where Windows Terminal application exe is located, it should be C:\Users\YOURUSER\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps\wt.exe. I created a shortcut to that file and checked "Run as administrator" in the advanced properties, then I just pinned it to start and voila. You can delete your temporary shortcut after that if you want.

Answer 8

You can create a shortcut to always run Windows Terminal as administrator using this powershell script:

$WshShell = New-Object -comObject WScript.Shell
$Shortcut = $WshShell.CreateShortcut("$Home\Desktop\Windows Terminal.lnk")
$Shortcut.TargetPath = "$env:LOCALAPPDATA\Microsoft\WindowsApps\Microsoft.WindowsTerminal_8wekyb3d8bbwe\wt.exe"
$Shortcut.Save()

$bytes = [System.IO.File]::ReadAllBytes("$Home\Desktop\Windows Terminal.lnk")
$bytes[0x15] = $bytes[0x15] -bor 0x20 #set byte 21 (0x15) bit 6 (0x20) ON 
[System.IO.File]::WriteAllBytes("$Home\Desktop\Windows Terminal.lnk", $bytes)

You can just paste it and run it from Windows Powershell ISE, it will create a Windows Terminal.lnk file on your desktop. Whenever you double click on that shortcut Windows terminal will run as an admnnistrator

Answer 9

I know this answer does not fully match your question but given that also other answers were oriented in this way I hope this won't disturb the discussion.

I always need to run PowerShell as Administrator and I only want to use Windows Terminal, which given it's restrictions cannot be configured to run always as Administrator.

I hated the need to use shortcuts and other hacks I found being suggested online, so I think I found a better solution but you have to pay the cost of a 1/2 seconds at startup.

1. Locate your user profile (A profile is a Windows PowerShell ISE script that runs automatically when you start a new session) using _ $PROFILE
2. Edit profile with any preferred editor _ code $PROFILE
3. Adde the following code to the profile file and save it

if (-NOT ([Security.Principal.WindowsPrincipal] [Security.Principal.WindowsIdentity]::GetCurrent()).IsInRole([Security.Principal.WindowsBuiltInRole] "Administrator")) {
    $host.ui.rawui.windowtitle="Bootstrapper"
    Start-Process -Verb RunAs wt
} else {
    $Processes = Get-Process | Where-Object {$_.mainWindowTitle -eq 'Bootstrapper' -and $_.name -eq 'WindowsTerminal'}
    if($Processes.count -gt 0)
    {
        Stop-Process -Id $Processes[0].id
    }
}

What the script do? You can pin Windows Terminal icon to your application bar and when you click there WT will start as non elevated user, but the profile will understand if this is the case. When you are not running as Administrator it will change the name of the window and start a new WT as administrator. The new instance will also execute the profile file and if the instance is runinng as Administrator, it will look for the WT named Bootstrapper and kill it. This proces takes between one and two seconds, I prefer this way other than right clicking on the icon.

Answer 10

It's likely you were just facing a Path issue. I know that the command examples you gave (e.g. Start-Process -verb RunAs wt) have worked for me for some time (as mentioned in @fialdrexs's answer).

Did you install Windows Terminal from a Github release or from the Store?

Answer 11

I currently have the following entry in my settings.json profiles list to add an elevated Windows Terminal to the drop down options:

{
    // https://github.com/microsoft/terminal/issues/632#issuecomment-663686412
    "name": "Windows Terminal (elevated)",
    "commandline": "%SystemRoot%\\System32\\WindowsPowerShell\\v1.0\\powershell.exe -Command Start-Process -Verb RunAs \"shell:appsFolder\\Microsoft.WindowsTerminal_8wekyb3d8bbwe!App\"",
    "hidden": false,
    "icon": "ms-appx:///Images/Square44x44Logo.targetsize-32.png"
}

The comment with the GitHub link should get you to where I originally found this information.

Answer 12

I find a away to workaround, just create a file bat with content

powershell Start-Process -Verb RunAs wt.exe

1. Save file yourfile.bat to folder you want.
2. Add path folder to System Environment.
3. Press WINDOW + R and type file bat name.

Answer 13

Currently this problem was fixed, but it ended up with a weird issue. Running wt.exe from Win+R, searching it on start menu, and starting itself from the terminal, show the same error message.

The application was unable to start correctly (0xc0000022). Click OK to close the application.

However it works when executing wt via Command Prompt, PowerShell, and PowerShell Core.

So just a quick workaround answer, start PowerShell and run the command, Start-Process -Verb RunAs wt.exe; or the simpler start -verb runas wt