PowerShell: Create Local User Account

Question

I need to create a new local user account, and then add them to the local Administrators group. Can this be done in PowerShell?

EDIT:

Answer 1

Try using Carbon's Install-User and Add-GroupMember functions:

Install-User -Username "User" -Description "LocalAdmin" -FullName "Local Admin by Powershell" -Password "Password01"
Add-GroupMember -Name 'Administrators' -Member 'User'

Disclaimer: I am the creator/maintainer of the Carbon project.

Answer 2

Import-Csv C:\test.csv |
Foreach-Object {
  NET USER    $ _.username   $ _.password /ADD
  NET LOCALGROUP "group" $_.username  /ADD
}

edit csv as username,password and change "group" for your groupname

:) worked on 2012 R2

Answer 3

As of 2014, here is a statement from a Microsoft representative (the Scripting Guy):

As much as we might hate to admit it, there are still no Windows PowerShell cmdlets from Microsoft that permit creating local user accounts or local user groups. We finally have a Desired State Configuration (DSC ) provider that can do this—but to date, no cmdlets.

Answer 4

Another alternative is the old school NET USER commands:

NET USER username "password" /ADD

OK - you can't set all the options but it's a lot less convoluted for simple user creation & easy to script up in Powershell.

NET LOCALGROUP "group" "user" /add to set group membership.

Answer 5

As of PowerShell 5.1 there cmdlet New-LocalUser which could create local user account.

Example of usage:

Create a user account

New-LocalUser -Name "User02" -Description "Description of this account." -NoPassword

or Create a user account that has a password

$Password = Read-Host -AsSecureString
New-LocalUser "User03" -Password $Password -FullName "Third User" -Description "Description of this account."

or Create a user account that is connected to a Microsoft account

New-LocalUser -Name "MicrosoftAccount\usr name@Outlook.com" -Description "Description of this account."