Jan 04, 2017 Hi, Not able to set the minimum password length to 15 characters in Windows server 2012 R2 via GPO. Some suggested to use ADSIEdit to change the attributes. Is this supported officially by Microsoft? I do not want to mess up anything. Thanks, Hi, As Richard suggested, you might need to have to modify Active Directory using ADSIEdit.msc, you could. Minimum password length.; 3 minutes to read; In this article Applies To: Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, Windows 7, Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows Server 2012, Windows 8. Apr 19, 2017 Reference. The Minimum password length policy setting determines the least number of characters that can make up a password for a user account. You can set a value of between 1 and 14 characters, or you can establish that no password is required by setting the number of characters to 0. To sum up what is the maximum password length in Windows 10 – The minimum length is 8 characters and the maximum is 127 characters for a Local Account. Configure Minimum and Maximum PIN Length in Windows 10 A PIN is an additional security feature available in Windows 10 and Windows 8.1 to protect your user account and all the sensitive data inside it. Change Account Lockout & Password Complexity Policy in Windows 10, 8, 7, Vista and XP. Unable to change Windows password and keep getting. Set Minimum password.
What is the maximum length of password in Windows systems? That is a question that may have crossed your mind some time. This post attempts to clear the confusion surrounding the many different versions of related articles on the Internet on this subject.
Having Strong Passwords is a must and is the first line of defense against hackers. You need to have strong password to protect your online accounts as well as your Windows computers. Generally speaking, I would recommend using passwords with length of 10 characters at least, with a mix of random special characters, capital and lower case alphabets & numerals to make the password or passphrase unbreakable. But the question bothering most of us is what is the maximum password length allowed in Windows 10.
Maximum length of password in Windows 10
Older Operating Systems prior to Windows XP
While the article is focused on Windows 10, I would like to take a minute to talk about the previous operating systems. These operating systems – MS DOS, Windows 95 and Windows 98 – were created in an era when security was not taken so seriously as it is taken today. Threats and times were different then! It was only with Windows NT, did things change.
Coming to password, in older operating systems, it depended on the programs you were running. Login passwords could not handle more than 14 characters. These too had some limitations. They wouldn’t accept white spaces like space character or a tab character. Some other special characters were also forbidden. But you could still create passwords that were strong – using a combination of lower and upper case alphabets, numbers and certain special characters.
If you still use Windows 98 or prior operating systems for some reason, it is better to keep the passwords limited to 14 characters. In case you have a network where you have modern operating systems along with the older ones, the Server passwords better be less than or equal to 14 characters, or you may face problems logging into those systems.
Max password length in Windows 10, Server 2003 & other modern operating systems
Internally, Windows represents passwords in 256-character UNICODE strings. The logon dialog is limited to 127 characters, however. Therefore, the longest password that can be used to log on interactively to a computer running Windows is 127 characters. Theoretically, programs such as services can use longer passwords, but they must be set programmatically because the password change dialog will not allow a password longer than 127 characters, says an article about Passwords FAQ on TechNet.
Technically, the length of passwords can be a maximum of 127 characters according to Microsoft. 127 characters mean that you can create easy phrases that you can easily remember and yet are strong passwords. However, some other considerations associated with these operating systems make you use shorter passwords.
For example, if you use a Microsoft Account to log into your Windows 10 computer, you are not allowed 127 characters. This is because Microsoft accounts (Live, Outlook, Hotmail etc) have a maximum limit of 16 characters only. Thus, even though the login box of Windows 10 allows 127 characters, you are forced to use a password of maximum 16 characters. Yahoo and Google are better in this case that allow 32 and 200 characters respectively.
When you sign in to your Microsoft account with a long password, you might see the following error message:
Microsoft account passwords can contain up to 16 characters. If you’ve been using a password that has more than 16 characters, enter the first 16.
This doesn’t mean that your password has been shortened. Windows Live ID passwords were always limited to 16 characters and any additional password characters were ignored by the sign-in process. When Microsoft changed “Windows Live ID” to “Microsoft account,” they also updated the sign-in page to let you know that only the first 16 characters of your password are necessary. To avoid this error message in the future, you only need to enter the first 16 characters of your password, says Microsoft.
The minimum number of characters used in Windows login and Microsoft Accounts is 8 characters and you can include all types of special characters (except the white space characters such as space and tabs etc). You can also use ALT+Numpad to create special characters and Windows 10 will happily accept that.
Login Dialog and Reset Password Dialogs
The login and reset password dialogs use “Windows elements” such as text boxes or combo boxes that can display only 32 characters at a time. But since the technical limit is 127 characters, you can continue to type the passwords even if you reach the max 32 characters’ limit of text and combo boxes. The text box will not display only the last 32 characters but you can be assured that all of the 127 characters have been logged by the login dialog and password reset dialogs. They will simply remove the initial characters and you may feel that the password is truncated to the last 32 characters but that is not the case. As mentioned earlier, all the 127 characters are accepted though not displayed in the text box owing to their limitations.
Imposing restrictions on Passwords
Talking of passwords, it becomes necessary to imposing restrictions on password policies that hardens Windows login policy and makes users create strong passwords. You can use Group Policy Editor or command prompt to force restrictions on password – such as imposing minimum and maximum length of passwords, force usage of special characters, expiry of passwords and more.
Conclusion
To sum up what is the maximum password length in Windows 10 –
The minimum length is 8 characters and the maximum is 127 characters for a Local Account
If you use Microsoft Account to log into your Windows 10 machine, you cannot use more than 16 characters
If you are using operating systems older than NT, limit the passwords to 14 characters else you’d face login problems.
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Windows 10 packs a lot of great security features, including biometric authentication with Windows Hello, malware protection with Windows Defender, and Windows Update to keep your device up to date and secure. However, even with all these features, your PC can still be vulnerable to unauthorized access if you keep using the same password for a long time.
Although users can change their password at any time, you can also configure the operating system to ask users to change it periodically.
There are at least three methods to do this, but the method you need to use will always depend on the edition of Windows your PC is running, and whether you're using a local or Microsoft account.
In this Windows 10 guide, we'll walk you through the steps to force users to change their password after a specific number of days to keep accounts a little more secure.
How to enforce password change using Group Policy
If you're running Windows 10 Pro, Enterprise, or Education, you can use the Local Group Policy Editor to quickly configure the time (in days) before users must change their password for a local account.
Use the Windows key + R keyboard shortcut to open the Run command.
Type gpedit.msc and click OK to open the Local Group Policy Editor.
On the right side, double-click the Maximum password age policy.
Set the number of days a password can be used before Windows 10 requires users to change it. (A good rule of thumb is to select 72 days.)
Click OK to complete the task.
After the period of time specified, users will get prompted to change their password as they try to sign in.
It's worth pointing out that there along with the maximum password age option, you can also force users to use a more complex password and even implement a password history, so they don't reuse an old password.
Here are the password policies available:
Enforce password history
Minimum password age
Minimum password length
How to enforce password change using Command Prompt
Windows 10 Home doesn't include the Local Group Policy Editor, but you can use Command Prompt to accomplish the same result.
Open Start.
Search for Command Prompt.
Right-click the result and select Run as administrator.
Type the following command to enable password to expire and press Enter:
wmic UserAccount set PasswordExpires=True
Type the following command to set the number of days a password can be used before Windows 10 requires users to change it and press Enter:
net accounts /maxpwage:72
Type the following command to review your new password policy and press Enter:
net accounts
After the period of time specified, similar to Group Policy, users will get a prompt to change their password as they try to sign in.
If you want to enforce password expiration for one user, then you can use the same steps, but on step 4, use this command instead:
wmic UserAccount where Name='USERNAME' set PasswordExpires=True
How to enforce password change on a Microsoft account
If you're using a Microsoft account, the steps we mentioned earlier won't work. However, you can enable an option on your account to make you change your password every 72 days.
Open your browser and sign in to your Microsoft account{.nofollow}.
On Security & privacy, click on the Change password link.
Create a new password.
Check the Make me change my password every 72 days option.
Click Next to complete the task.
Max Password Length Windows
The caveat with this option is that you don't have the flexibility to choose a number of days, but 72 days is one of the most common recommended time frames to force users to change their account password.
In addition, it's important to note that with this change, you will not only be making your Windows 10 account more secure, but every other service you use with a Microsoft account, including OneDrive, Outlook.com, Skype, and others.
Windows 10 Maximum Password Length
Keep in mind that while we're focusing this guide on Windows 10, you can use the steps to use Group Policy and Command Prompt to force users to change their passwords on Windows 8.1 and Windows 7.
Do you periodically change your account password on Windows 10? Tell us in the comments below.
Windows 10 Change Password Requirements
More Windows 10 resources
Windows 10 Maximum Password Length
For more help articles, coverage, and answers on Windows 10, you can visit the following resources: