Ways to improve your Windows PowerShell experience

If you’re a developer or power user, you probably use Windows PowerShell a lot. For those who don’t know, PowerShell and Command Prompt are used to run and use advanced Windows features and development, with PowerShell being a command-line software that’s superior to CMD. Microsoft continues to add new features to PowerShell, so if you haven’t updated it in a while, here’s how to upgrade Windows PowerShell.

It is worth noting that PowerShell, up to version 5.1, was automatically updated by Windows Updates. However, the new version 7.x is no longer managed by Windows Updates and requires a manual update. Regardless of the version, you can follow the steps below to update/install the latest version of PowerShell. To check your PowerShell version, type the command $PSVersionTable in your existing PowerShell application.

Method 1: Upgrade PowerShell using the Microsoft Store

We often overlook the Microsoft Store because we are used to installing EXE files from the Internet. The Microsoft Store can help you update PowerShell quickly, and here’s how:

1. Launch Microsoft Store from the Start menu.
2. Click on the Downloads tab at the bottom left.
3. This will show you all the available updates. Here, check if a PowerShell update is available and if so, click on Update.
4. You can also click on Update all to update all apps at once.

Method 2: Update using PowerShell Installer

Did you know that the new PowerShell 7.x is open source? Anyway, its installer is available on the official PowerShell website and on GitHub. Here’s how to update to the latest version of Windows PowerShell using the installer.

1. Go to the Official PowerShell GitHub repository.
2. Go to the Press Releases page and click on the last one win-x64.msi file to download the installer.
3. Once downloaded, double-click the installer to launch it and click Following.
4. Click on Following for the following prompts to continue.
5. Now click on Install.

Method 3: Upgrade PowerShell using Winget

Winget is a package manager and the equivalent of APT or DNF on Windows. It works quite well and can be used to download new packages/applications or update existing ones. Here’s how to use it to update Windows PowerShell.

1. Launch Windows PowerShell and type the following command.

Update winget microsoft.powershell

1. If you don’t have PowerShell installed, you can use the following command to install it.

winget install –id Microsoft.Powershell –source winget

1. Once this is done, you should have the updated or new version of PowerShell installed.

Method 4: Update PowerShell using Windows Update

This only applies to older versions of Windows and PowerShell. If you are using an older version of Windows, your version of PowerShell will also be older, and you will need to upgrade to the latest version of Windows to have the latest version of PowerShell.

1. Go to Settings > Windows Updates.
2. Click Check for updates and Windows should find and install them automatically.
3. Once done, restart your Windows PC and you should have the latest version of PowerShell for your version of Windows.

And here are the methods you can use to upgrade PowerShell on Windows. The first two are by far the easiest methods to update it quickly. Were you able to upgrade PowerShell by following the steps? Let us know in the comments.