7/2/13 How to Create Hidden User Account (Hide User Account from Welcome Screen) in Windows « My Digital Life

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Feb 21, 2009 My Digital Life Editorial Team 110 Comments DeliciousStumbleUpon

How to Create Hidden User Account (Hide UserAccount from Welcome Screen) in Windows

Windows operating system including Windows 7,

Windows Vista and Windows XP allows multiple

user accounts to be created on the computer, be

it administrators or standard users. When there

is more than one user accounts been defined and

created on the PC, Windows will display

Welcome Screen, with all available user

accounts listed so that user can click and login.

However, showing and displaying of user

accounts on the Welcome Screen is probably a

weakness in the security point of view, more so if

the user account is intended to be a hidden or

backup user account. In fact, there is trick to

make user account or administrator account that

normally been listed on the Welcome Screen to

be hidden from view.

In order to hide a user account (which also means create a hidden user account) in Windows XP, Vista,

or Windows 7, just go to Control Panel User module and create an additional user as usually do

(Control Panel -> User Accounts and Family Safety -> User Accounts in Windows 7 and Windows

Vista). If you already have an existing user that wants to be made hidden, invisible or disappeared from

Welcome Screen, then go straight to guide below.

1. Run Registry Editor (RegEdit.exe).

2. Navigate to the following registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows

NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\SpecialAccounts\UserList

Note: If SpecialAccounts and UserList is not found, create new sub-key and name them accordingly.

3. Select UserList, and in the right pane, right click on any blank space, and point to New -> DWORD

(32-bit) Value.

4. Name the new DWORD registry value name as the exact same name that match the name of the

user account to be hidden.

For example, if the user ID of the user account is John, the name the registry value as John.

5. Double click on DWORD registry value, and set the value data to 0 in oder to hide the account from

Welcome Screen.

Tip: To display the user account on Welcome Screen again so that it’s visible again, delete the registry

entry, or set the value data to 1.

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7/2/13 How to Create Hidden User Account (Hide User Account from Welcome Screen) in Windows « My Digital Life

www.mydigitallife.info/how-to-create-hidden-user-account-hide-user-account-from-welcome-screen-in-windows/ 2/9

6. Exit Registry Editor.

7. Log off or restart computer to make the change effective.

Tip: In order to login into Windows using an user account that has made hidden and invisible, just press

Ctrl+Alt+Del to bring up Windows Logon dialog, and then type in the user name and password

manually.

Related Posts:

How to Automatically Log On or Sign In to a User Account in Windows 7

How to Disable or Deactivate User Account in Windows 7

Reveal All Hidden User Folders In “Send To” Right Click Menu in Windows 7

Turn Off or Disable User Account Control (UAC) in Windows Vista

How to Clear and Don’t Display Last User Name who Logged In On Windows Logon Screen

110 Comments

Max March 2, 2013 at 6:53 am

Or you could just type

net user enter_account_name_here /active:no

in a command window after running it as Administer

REPLY

Jeff March 4, 2013 at 8:18 am

Max, there is a huge difference between this and using /active:no. You can still use

accounts hidden through this method, ie in Run As User, or for remotely logging onto

the computer

REPLY

kaz February 12, 2013 at 2:16 am

Here is the quick solution to everybody’s problems [Vista and 7]:

1) Log in to any user on the computer

2) Start>Run [Win>R, keyboard] and type in regedit. A UAC (User Access Control) window

will pop up.

3) Enter credentials of hidden user account

4) ???

5) Profit.

REPLY

marcus February 3, 2013 at 11:22 pm

everyone shut up for a sec – people like me are saying that when we press ctrl alt del – it

doesnt work, now help

REPLY

IT lover November 11, 2012 at 1:35 pm

It works perfectly!

thanks

REPLY

edwin January 26, 2012 at 5:24 pm REPLY

7/2/13 How to Create Hidden User Account (Hide User Account from Welcome Screen) in Windows « My Digital Life

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ok, let settled this matter once and for all. @all, b4 you hid any user account using the

method above, pls do the following if you are a win7 or vista user.

type in secpol.msc into the start menu search box and then navigate to Local Policies \

Security Options.

Find the setting for “Interactive Logon: Do not display last user name” and change it to

enabled.

@poster, pls update your post.

Wammy August 28, 2012 at 9:59 pm

secpol.msc is not available in Win7 Home Premium. Either that or I’m doing something

wrong.

The registry edit worked, but now there’s no way for me to get to the hidden account

from the login screen.

REPLY

Anonymous November 19, 2012 at 12:23 am

That will work in only in Windows 7 Professional or higher versions..Genius!

REPLY

Hiding User Account Renders Administrator Inaccesible -Overclockedtechies January 10, 2012 at 6:10 am

[...] for the kicker, I was told the user followed this tutorial (http://www.mydigitallife.info/how-to-

create-hidden-user-account-hide-user-account-from-welcome-scree… – that post should be

DELETED) to hide the admin account, if you read the comments you will find [...]

REPLY

Kshitiz January 3, 2012 at 12:30 am

Thanks very much. it was very useful

REPLY

jekjan December 15, 2011 at 10:16 pm

hey

when i press control +alt + del nothing shows up

REPLY

Thanks October 25, 2011 at 12:23 pm

Thanks! It works! I wanted to create a new admin account for backup processing but don’t

want to show it on my logon screen. I have another admin account that I use normally.

*cheers*

REPLY

lolcat October 21, 2011 at 7:16 pm

an easier method would be to enable “Interactive logon: Do not display last user name” in the

local group policy editor,and that wont lock you out of your admin account like the method

described here.

REPLY

prince September 27, 2011 at 3:38 pm

is there any way to hide it totally without it been seen in control panel or in local user account

REPLY

jonnie walker September 20, 2011 at 2:13 am

after restart when i press ctrl alt del. nothing happens :S

REPLY

Lars September 14, 2011 at 1:10 pm

I took three eggs and cracked them on the side of the bowl, added three cups of orange

extract, two teaspoons, no, oops, two TABLE spoons of cane sugar and a cup of flour. Even

though I baked for 30 minutes at 350 degrees I still can't find my underwear when the dryer

goes to the delicate cycle because, let's face it; DAMN. I need to go on a diet.

REPLY

7/2/13 How to Create Hidden User Account (Hide User Account from Welcome Screen) in Windows « My Digital Life

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What's say you?

Ramy September 9, 2011 at 6:32 am

this post is hillarious… "including Windows 7" … seriously? What a poorly written article.

WARNING – Once you do this in Windows 7, you WILL disable all accounts that you put into

the UserList (including Administrator if you add it to the list. Ctrl Alt Del does NOT work in

Windows 7 to bring up classic login box. All of the "noob" comments are worthless also since

this article is aimed toward them.

REPLY

Cunty November 27, 2012 at 5:02 am

WROOOOOOOOOONG. Ctrl+Alt+Del can be enabled to bring up manual login on

Windows 7. Thought thats pretty basic stuff………………………………………….. You’d

think that all these geeks on a computer post would know what they’re talking about.

But no, ALAS. All the virgins have got it wrong.

REPLY

LoLz @ U Lot August 16, 2011 at 4:21 pm

the whole point of hiding it is so it cant be logged on! why would you want to hide it if you

wanted it to be usable aswell, there are many uses for that account e.g. network logon and as

mentioned above, running elevated tasks. also why hide the only admin account? your

obviously locking yourself out!

We have an id10t problem in here and its nothing to do with me.

REPLY

Orlynao? August 26, 2011 at 7:38 am

I have my way to get through it and access the winlogon account via the winlogon, with

a certain logon program. If you know what you are doing, you will certainly able to make

use of this function well.

With this, I have my account hidden nicely.

REPLY

Undefined July 23, 2011 at 8:28 pm

This is a good post though it does work only for XP and Vista maybe but windows 7 does not

have "Special accounts" folder in the registry. But as I was reading through the comments, I

just found out that the comments are posted by damn stupid no0bs who don't even understand

what they are doing.. Just following the steps isnt enough, u need to knw what you are doing !

Anyways this is a good post

REPLY

scorp July 6, 2011 at 2:41 pm

Omg guys,

if you hide your account, it does not mean it has been disabled. Simply run cmd under any

user and write:

"runas /u:admin cmd" … where "admin" is your hidden account, it will prompt for password.

Type it there and system will run command line with the rights of admin. Then type "regedit"

and delete that account from registry.

no need to do anything with restore or similar workarounds..

REPLY

hans May 26, 2011 at 11:13 pm

The above steps only work for previous / earlier versions of windows except VISTA and

Windows 7…

REPLY

Alex May 26, 2011 at 10:11 pm

I strongly suggest you indicate that the Ctrl+Alt+Del shortcut works ONLY on pre-Vista.

I followed your directions and hid my only admin account, hoping to access it using the

combination but it failed.

But for the fact that I'd created a System Restore point on the previous day, I might have had

to reinstall my OS.

REPLY

7/2/13 How to Create Hidden User Account (Hide User Account from Welcome Screen) in Windows « My Digital Life

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Andres May 21, 2011 at 3:17 pm

this bullshit post screwed my computer up… I can't access or unblocked my administrator

account…please help…my operating system is vista…DO NOT FOLLOW THIS POST, IT IS

GONNA BLOCKED YOUR ADMINISTRATOR ACCOUNT FOREVER… STUPID WEBSITE :/

REPLY

Pissed May 20, 2011 at 8:29 am

Why are you guys leaving this post up. I just wasted 20 minutes fixing your lame handy work.

TAKE DOWN THIS POST. AND IF YOUR READING THIS, I URGE YOU TO STOP NOW!

The simple fix: First off, don't panic, yes you just got screwed!

Then navigate to your system drive, and open your windows folder. Typically "C:windows".

Find "regedit.exe", while depressing the shift key, right click the file, and choose "Run as

different user". Enter your credentials and walla.

Note: selecting "Run as administrator" will not work. And baring any folder lockouts, this could

also work on the "system restore" link under "all programs / accessories".

And again, "REMOVE THIS POST, YOUR INVITING TROUBLE FROM THE WRONG

PEOPLE!!"

REPLY

Eph July 9, 2011 at 9:46 am

Thanks for this post. The people that are complaining dont understand what the purpose

of this action is. Please dont delete this.

REPLY

grant May 6, 2011 at 7:31 am

Please note that hitting Ctrl+Alt+Del twice doesn't work on Windows 7 (when tested with

Windows 7 Professional, May, 2011). This article is very helpful for other operating systems,

but please don't try it with Windows 7. You may have to go in and reverse the registry change

in order to have your hidden account show up again.

Dear MDL Editorial Team… do you have an update with some tips for Windows 7 users on this

issue? Thanks!

REPLY

Chris May 4, 2011 at 6:14 pm

NOTICE TO ALL PEOPLE: the ctrl+alt+del only works if the last operation was a restart or log

off. It does not work if you just switch users.

REPLY

andycire March 9, 2011 at 10:15 pm

Just follow the comment posted by Carlito:

** QUICK FIX FOR PPL LOCKED OUT OF ACCOUNTS **

This process will truly help you…

REPLY

ankit February 18, 2011 at 6:50 am

oh that's awesome baby

thanx …………

REPLY

MrBIL January 9, 2011 at 11:22 am

SOLUTION

If you have locked yourself out by implementing this in Winders.7 and hiding all Admin

accounts:

From another Win7 machine on the same LAN, do a Remote Desktop session to the problem

computer. (If you cannot find the icon, just type "mstsc" (without the quotes) in the search box

and press [Enter])

Via Remote Desktop, logon with Admin credentials, then reverse what you did to hide the

admin accounts, make it/them visible again on the logon screen.

REPLY

7/2/13 How to Create Hidden User Account (Hide User Account from Welcome Screen) in Windows « My Digital Life

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If the problem computer is already on the logon screen, you'll need to either login with any

available account, then log back off OR restart Winders in order to see the effects of your

change.

Enjoy!

akhil July 13, 2011 at 1:35 am

thanks man! awsome, you've just made my task easier

REPLY

UGH. December 26, 2010 at 11:50 am

what the hell… i am so screwed. YAR i didnt read your comment before making this and i

made the only admin on our cpu invisible. AM I SCREWED?! is there any freaking way to fix

this?? please help… i have like files that i really need.

REPLY

MaltaBoy December 7, 2010 at 5:56 am

*before* you hide users, *enable* CTRL-ALT-DEL for logon as follows, since it is NOT

ENABLED by default in Windows 7:

- Go to the start menu

- in the search box type: netplwiz

- right click netplwiz and chose "run as Administrator"

- in the user account floater that appears, go to the tab "Advanced"

- now tick "Require users to press CTRL+Alt+Delete"

REPLY

AtechSupportGuy July 30, 2011 at 12:12 pm

This^̂ ̂Thanks. Most important bit of information in the entire page. You should email

this to the guy that wrote the article.

REPLY

Jonathan September 22, 2011 at 6:45 pm

YOU ARE THE ONE, MAN !

REPLY

Koffecopter December 7, 2010 at 5:43 am

I'm not sure if I did right, but this bs doesn't work for me,

I created "SpecialAccounts" in WinLogon and then created "UserList" in that one, then that

registry key value to the User ID and then changed the value to 0.

I followed the instructions exactly, but it doesn't work……………………………..

REPLY

Yar December 7, 2010 at 4:47 am

As others have pointed out – since Windows 7 removed the ctrl-alt-del[2] function that

temporarily enables the mandatory login prompt, this trick is NOT recommended on Windows

7 and will likely cause significant impairment. If you have the discretionary login enabled (the

welcome screen where you pick an account) and you hide an account, then you can never

access that account again without peforming one of the painful recovery steps that other

commenters have listed. As long as you keep one admin account enabled you can use a

program like WinBubbles to manage this fairly easily, but if you hide all your admins, or even

worse, all of your users, then you are in trouble.

REPLY

Biomorph November 11, 2010 at 11:54 am

OK. THE "Ctrl, Alt, Del" to reveal hidden users in Win7 logon screen does not work.

Here is how I fixed it so that I could get back control of my machine.

Grab a copy of Offline NT Password & Registry Editor http://pogostick.net/~pnh/ntpasswd/

Create the boot cd from the .iso

Boot with the cd.

REPLY

7/2/13 How to Create Hidden User Account (Hide User Account from Welcome Screen) in Windows « My Digital Life

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Choose "Promote User" from the menu.

Promote a normal user to an admin user.

Save changes and reboot into win7.

Login with the newly promoted user and delete the registy entry previously created.

Logout, and the hidden user now shows on the login screen.

Note to the author of this site: PLEASE UPDATE THIS TIP TO POINT OUT THAT THIS WILL

CRIPPLE A WIN 7 MACHINE!!!

hello October 8, 2010 at 8:02 am

i love this.use the "Run as" if u dont need to log-on(shift +right click a program, enter account

credentials of hidden account).i just use it to make the pc more secure.i never need to log in

to the account, just to run elevated stuff. happy days.and to all the noobs who didnt do it write,

you make me laugh.hahahahhahaha.also, you can change windows to use the ctrl+alt+delete

screen-look on the net somewhere.

REPLY

Ravi October 6, 2010 at 5:17 am

Fuck

Who's wrote these….after creating new key-sub key…the process not working….

REPLY

Awesome September 30, 2010 at 7:31 am

Cheers for the info. Worked like a charm.

REPLY

Perkele September 28, 2010 at 4:26 am

WTF, now I must reisntall my pc, because I have workin admin account now. that should be

hang by the neck… who wrote that fucking instraction….

REPLY

Nime September 15, 2010 at 5:17 am

Restart in safe mode then you will access the administrative or hidden account(s) again.

REPLY

Robaye August 23, 2010 at 7:11 pm

There are a couple of freeware hide utilities I've seen. I keep them both handy.

User Control usercontrol.isgreat.org

XP User Hide intelliadmin.com

REPLY

Wilson August 15, 2010 at 6:47 pm

This was not useful at all because I can't go on any farther than the logon screen BECAUSE I

CAN'T LOGIN.

REPLY

pokematrix247 July 23, 2010 at 12:19 pm

I can not get any of it working,

speacial users does not show up,

+ alt+ctrl+dlt doesn't work!!!

help

REPLY

Siamak Shams » Windows 7: How to Hide User Login May 21, 2010 at 10:35 pm

[...] account. This is done by manipulating Windows Registry. I found the most useful

instructions at My Digital Life. You’ll find the same or similar instructions in quite a few

places too. The instructions are [...]

REPLY

Tito May 3, 2010 at 3:48 am REPLY

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try pressing "Ctrl + Alt + Delete[2]" means press Delete twice, it will surely work

Mayflower May 3, 2010 at 3:09 am

DOESN'T WORK!!! VERY DISSAPOINTED.

REPLY

Pyvarex April 26, 2010 at 10:34 am

the ctrl alt del function only work on the home screen when no users are logged on!

REPLY

isaac April 25, 2010 at 9:35 am

i had an error

REPLY

Albert April 15, 2010 at 9:53 pm

Close but no cigar…. How can you log on to the account once it is hidden. The CTRL DELETE

will not work.

Nice Try tho.

REPLY

Riddles April 12, 2010 at 5:27 pm

I was able to hide the other user account but the Ctrl+Alt+Del DOES NOT WORK!!!! on logon

screen for Windows 7.

REPLY

Hamid April 12, 2010 at 3:52 pm

I did this to Hide my Adminstrator. Now I can't log on as an Admin, I tried to delete it but it

wount let me. can you please help me.

REPLY

writinghelp May 12, 2011 at 8:53 am

Dear Hamid you can do it from another account. Delete that registry key and the issue

would be resolved.

REPLY

Hawken April 11, 2010 at 2:42 pm

But you can still see it from control panel… is there any way to hide it from there as well?

The information is awesome

Keep up the good work

REPLY

Naineesh April 10, 2010 at 2:33 am

you guys are awesome,you have every information which everyone needs.

REPLY

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