▷ How to open and use command prompt windows 10 or cmd

As we well know Windows is characterized mainly by its graphical interface. With this operating system, everything, or almost everything, we can do thanks to its complex windows environment. But in this system we not only have this option to move, in this article we will see how to use the Windows 10 command prompt, also called CMD.

Index of contents

Command Prompt Windows 10 is a very useful tool especially to use certain tools as if we were in MS-DOS. What's more, sometimes it is faster to use this one, to open 200 windows until locating some configuration that we need.

What is CMD or command prompt

The Windows command console or CMD is one of the indispensable resources, especially for computer system administrators. CMD is a terminal or console where we can work in the operating system without using a mouse or a graphical environment for windows.

Through this black-looking window, we can move through the different directories in our system, make all kinds of configurations, run applications and all kinds of things. But we will not be able to do this by clicking a mouse or seeing windows, all this will be done through commands that will show the functions they do on this screen.

PowerShell

Since the Windows 10 era, Microsoft has been implementing another command console in our operating system. Its name is PowerShell and it is practically an improved and more complete version of the traditional command prompt. Thanks to PowerShell we will be able to do exactly the same as we could do at a command prompt, but in a more intuitive and advanced way. Let's say it's like the Linux Terminal version.

How to open Windows 10 command prompt

To open the Windows command console we will have several different options available. You can choose the one you like the most, in a next section, we will teach you a very useful trick to access it directly.

Open CMD with Run

If you don't know the run tool visit our How to use run in Windows 10 article to know more about it.

• What we will have to do is press the key combination " Windows + R " to open the execute tool. Then we write " cmd " in the text box that appears in the window. We will press Enter or we will click " OK " to be able to open symbol of the system.

With the Run tool we will not be able to open command prompt with administrator permissions

Open command console with Start

Obviously, the command prompt is found within the options of the start menu. Through this we will have several ways to access it if you need to have to search for it within the list of applications.

• We open the start menu and write " CMD " or " Command Prompt ", in any case the tool will appear as the main search option. If we right-click on it, we can run it with administrator permissions. We will see later what is the difference between running it normally or as an administrator.

In addition, we will also have the option to anchor this icon in the start menu or in the taskbar to access it directly.

Open command console from folder browser

Yes, we can also open this tool with the Windows folder explorer. We will only have to go to the address bar and write " cmd ". When we press Enter the window will open.

With this method we will not be able to open command prompt with administrator permissions

Run Windows 10 command prompt as administrator

As you have noticed in the previous section we will have two options to open the command prompt, one with administrator permissions and the other in a normal way.

The fundamental difference of both methods is that, if we run this tool as an administrator, we will be able to execute a greater number of commands than if we are as a normal user.

This is a way to prevent users with normal permissions from touching critical system configuration files and causing crashes. Said in a more intuitive way, it is as if the system lets us have full control over all its configuration (at least most).

How to know if we have opened command prompt as administrator

The way to identify this is simple. When we open the Windows command window we can see how the prompt (the line that indicates that it is ready to receive commands) contains an address.

• If we execute as normal user our prompt will be "C : \ Users \ > ”. If we run as administrator the prompt will be“ C: \ Windows \ system32 ”. We see that we are directly inside a system folder.

Create Windows 10 command prompt shortcut as administrator

As we anticipate before, we are going to get the fastest way to access the command prompt and with administrator permissions. We will have to do the following:

• Located on the desktop we will right-click and choose " New ". Then we choose " Shortcut " In the window of the wizard to create a shortcut write the following:

C: \ Windows \ System32 \ cmd.exe

• Click on next to finish creating the shortcut. Now to be able to run it as an administrator we must click on the shortcut and choose " Properties ". Inside the " Shortcut " tab, click on the " Advanced options " button. A new window will open. where we must activate the option " Run as administrator "

In this way, whenever we execute the direct access, we will enter as administrator in the command prompt.

We already know what the command prompt is and how we should open it according to what we need. To see the real usefulness of this command window we invite you to visit these tutorials:

Do you think CMD is really useful for Windows 10? Leave in the comments anything you want to share on this topic