When installing Windows Server 2019, as with previous versions of Windows, you are prompted to enter the product key during installation, however if you are waiting for licensing to arrive, you can skip this and continue building your server. Once the licensing arrives, you can enter the product key from the Settings app, but in my case, clicking the Change Product Key button resulted in absolutely nothing. The window did not pop up, no error in the event logs, nothing at all. In this article, I will show you how to enter your product key manually using command line utilities, then activating using the same utility.
- Click Start and type CMD in the Start Search menu
- Right Click and choose Run as administrator
- To remove any existing product key (in case you used a trial key), enter and run the command slmgr.vbs /upk .
- Clear the product key from registry by running slmgr.vbs /cpky
- To enter your new product key, use the command: slmgr.vbs /ipk xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx where the x’s are your actual product key.
- Lastly, activate Windows by entering the command slmgr.vbs /ato
- Windows is now activated.
From my research, this appears to be a fairly common issue. Some users reported completely reloading Windows and entering the key from the start to resolve the issue, but if you have already configured the server or workstation, that’s not really an option. After running the above commands, my servers were activated and running normally. So far, this is my only hiccup with Server 2019.
If you’re looking to build a new server or upgrade, check out Windows Server 2019 on Amazon.
Thank you for this information, I had the same problem with 2019 Server Standard and using CMD worked.
Same here, this worked for me
Thanks, this worked for me..
Brilliant, spend 2h on this with other commands and workarounds, but with this information, solved! Many thanks!
Thank you!!! This worked after multiple other attempts would not work.
Thanks! This helped me as well.
Thanks a bundle
Thanks, this helped me as well
Many thanks .. worked like a charm π
Thanks so much for the assistance. Worked like a charm.
Thanks for the “hack” ……. It’s a common issue, has to do with uac.
The GUI works as local admin.
The GUI does not work as domain admin
On a DC it’s not possible to logon as local admin so the shell is the last rescue ……
Thanks, but I’m not able to solve.
Work for me
Fantastic!! It worked……
That was easy, thanks
Thank you for the help. It worked flawlessly
Thank you! Was easy to find on google and helped.
Excellent that is detailed and worked fine! No rebuild for me.
This worked for me
dism /online /set-edition:ServerStandard /productkey:XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX /accepteula
Me too
dism worked for me too like charme
This helped solve my activation issue with Windows Server 2019 (migrated a physical to virtual and the problem surfaced). Found this article via Google and Walah! Saved the day! Thanks for taking the time to provide a fix!
Thank you sir. Its guys like you who save those of us after the fact immeasurable amounts of time.
Fantastic! Thanks for sharing
Thank you, I was sweting buckets….
Worked great ! Thanks.
Actually, activation happened automatically after step 5. So didn’t have to do step 6 π
You save my day ! Thanks
Thanks very much for this seems to have worked.
Thanks a lot!!!
worked thanks
Have a try on “onthehubstore”.
That’s easy and effective. Also I tried onthehubstore.
It worked perfectly for me!