How to run a PowerShell script without displaying a window

Question

How is it possible to run a PowerShell script without displaying a window or any other sign to the user   In other words  the script should run quietly in the background without any sign to the user   Extra credit for an answer that does not use third party components

User · Answer

I got really tired of going through answers only to find it did not work as expected.

Solution

Make a vbs script to run a hidden batch file which launches the powershell script. Seems silly to make 3 files for this task but atleast the total size is less than 2KB and it runs perfect from tasker or manually (you dont see anything).

scriptName.vbs

Set WinScriptHost = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
WinScriptHost.Run Chr(34) & "C:\Users\leathan\Documents\scriptName.bat" & Chr(34), 0
Set WinScriptHost = Nothing

scriptName.bat

powershell.exe -ExecutionPolicy Bypass C:\Users\leathan\Documents\scriptName.ps1

scriptName.ps1

Your magical code here.

User · Answer

I have created a small tool passing the call to any console tool you want to start windowless through to the original file   https   github com Vittel RunHiddenConsole  After compiling just rename the executable to   lt targetExecutableName gt w exe   append a  w    and put it next to the original executable  You can then call e G  powershellw exe with the usual parameters and it wont pop up a window   If someone has an idea how to check whether the created process is waiting for input  ill be happy to include your solution

User · Answer

c  quot powershell exe -ExecutionPolicy Bypass  New-Object -ComObject Wscript Shell  popup  Hello World   0      64  quot  s Left CreateObject  quot Scriptlet TypeLib quot   Guid 38  GetObject  quot new  C08AFD90-F2A1-11D1-8455-00A0C91F3880  quot   putProperty s Me WScript CreateObject  quot WScript Shell quot   Run c 0 false

User · Answer

Here is a working solution in windows 10 that does not include any third-party components  It works by wrapping the PowerShell script into VBScript   Step 1  we need to change some windows features to allow VBScript to run PowerShell and to open  ps1 files with PowerShell by default   -go to run and type  regedit   Click on ok and then allow it to run   -paste this path  HKEY CLASSES ROOT Microsoft PowerShellScript 1 Shell  and press enter   -now open the entry on the right and change the value to 0    -open PowerShell as an administrator and type  Set-ExecutionPolicy -ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned   press enter and confirm the change with  y  and then enter   Step 2  Now we can start wrapping our script   -save your Powershell script as a  ps1 file   -create a new text document and paste this script   Dim objShell objFSO objFile  Set objShell CreateObject  WScript Shell   Set objFSO CreateObject  Scripting FileSystemObject     enter the path for your PowerShell Script  strPath  c  your script path script ps1    verify file exists  If objFSO FileExists strPath  Then     return short path name    set objFile objFSO GetFile strPath     strCMD  powershell -nologo -command    amp  Chr 34   amp    amp     amp       objFile ShortPath  amp       amp  Chr 34      Uncomment next line for debugging     WScript Echo strCMD     use 0 to hide window    objShell Run strCMD 0  Else     Display error message    WScript Echo  Failed to find    amp  strPath    WScript Quit  End If   -now change the file path to the location of your  ps1 script and save the text document   -Now right-click on the file and go to rename  Then change the filename extension to  vbs and press enter and then click ok   DONE  If you now open the  vbs you should see no console window while your script is running in the background   make sure to upvote if this worked for you

User · Answer

When you scheduled task  just select  quot Run whether user is logged on or not quot  under the  quot General quot  tab  Alternate way is to let the task run as another user

User · Answer

Wait until Powershell is executed and get the result in vbs This is an improved version of the Omegastripes code Hide command prompt window when using Exec   Splits the confused responses from cmd exe into an array instead of putting everything into a hard-to-parse string  In addition  if an error occurs during the execution of cmd exe  a message about its occurrence will become known in vbs  Option Explicit Sub RunCScriptHidden       strSignature   Left CreateObject  quot Scriptlet TypeLib quot   Guid  38      GetObject  quot new  C08AFD90-F2A1-11D1-8455-00A0C91F3880  quot   putProperty strSignature  Me     objShell Run   quot  quot  quot  quot   amp  Replace LCase WScript FullName    quot wscript quot    quot cscript quot    amp   quot  quot  quot    nologo  quot  quot  quot   amp  WScript ScriptFullName  amp   quot  quot  quot   quot  quot  signature  quot   amp  strSignature  amp   quot  quot  quot  quot    0  True End Sub Sub WshShellExecCmd       For Each objWnd In CreateObject  quot Shell Application quot   Windows         If IsObject objWnd getProperty WScript Arguments Named  quot signature quot     Then Exit For     Next     Set objParent   objWnd getProperty WScript Arguments Named  quot signature quot        objWnd Quit      objParent strRes   CreateObject  quot WScript Shell quot   Exec objParent strCmd  StdOut ReadAll    simple solution     Set exec   CreateObject  quot WScript Shell quot   Exec objParent strCmd      While exec Status   WshRunning         WScript Sleep 20     Wend     Dim err     If exec ExitCode   WshFailed Then         err   exec StdErr ReadAll     Else         output   Split exec StdOut ReadAll Chr 10       End If     If err  quot  quot  Then         objParent strRes   output UBound output -1   array of results  you can  output 0  Join output  - Usually needed is the last     Else         objParent wowError   err     End If WScript Quit End Sub Const WshRunning   0 WshFailed   1 Dim i name objShell Dim strCmd  strRes  objWnd  objParent  strSignature  wowError  output  exec  Set objShell   WScript CreateObject  quot WScript Shell quot   wowError False strCmd    quot C  Windows System32 WindowsPowerShell v1 0 powershell exe -ExecutionPolicy Bypass Write-Host Hello-World  quot  If WScript Arguments Named Exists  quot signature quot   Then WshShellExecCmd RunCScriptHidden If wowError False Then     objShell popup strRes  Else     objShell popup  quot Error  quot   amp  wowError  End If

User · Answer

You can either run it like this  but this shows a windows for a while    PowerShell exe -windowstyle hidden   your script       Or you use a helper file I created to avoid the window called PsRun exe that does exactly that  You can download source and exe file Run scheduled tasks with WinForm GUI in PowerShell  I use it for scheduled tasks   Edited  as Marco noted this -windowstyle parameter is available only for V2

User · Answer

Here s a fun demo of controlling the various states of the console  including minimize and hidden   Add-Type -Name ConsoleUtils -Namespace WPIA -MemberDefinition        DllImport  Kernel32 dll       public static extern IntPtr GetConsoleWindow        DllImport  user32 dll       public static extern bool ShowWindow IntPtr hWnd  Int32 nCmdShow        ConsoleMode       HIDDEN   0   NORMAL   1   MINIMIZED   2   MAXIMIZED   3   SHOW   5  RESTORE   9      hWnd    WPIA ConsoleUtils   GetConsoleWindow     a    WPIA ConsoleUtils   ShowWindow  hWnd   ConsoleMode MAXIMIZED   maximized  a  Start-Sleep 2  a    WPIA ConsoleUtils   ShowWindow  hWnd   ConsoleMode NORMAL   normal  a  Start-Sleep 2  a    WPIA ConsoleUtils   ShowWindow  hWnd   ConsoleMode MINIMIZED   minimized  a  Start-Sleep 2  a    WPIA ConsoleUtils   ShowWindow  hWnd   ConsoleMode RESTORE   restore  a  Start-Sleep 2  a    WPIA ConsoleUtils   ShowWindow  hWnd   ConsoleMode HIDDEN   hidden  a  Start-Sleep 2  a    WPIA ConsoleUtils   ShowWindow  hWnd   ConsoleMode SHOW   show  a

User · Answer

Here s an approach that that doesn t require command line args or a separate launcher  It s not completely invisible because a window does show momentarily at startup  But it then quickly vanishes  Where that s OK  this is  I think  the easiest approach if you want to launch your script by double-clicking in explorer  or via a Start menu shortcut  including  of course the Startup submenu   And I like that it s part of the code of the script itself  not something external   Put this at the front of your script    t     DllImport  user32 dll    public static extern bool ShowWindow int handle  int state    add-type -name win -member  t -namespace native  native win   ShowWindow   System Diagnostics Process   GetCurrentProcess     Get-Process  MainWindowHandle  0

User · Answer

ps1 hidden from the Task Scheduler and shortcut too      mshta vbscript Execute  CreateObject   WScript Shell    Run   powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass  amp   C  PATH NAME ps1     0 close

User · Answer

I was having this same issue  I found out if you go to the Task in Task Scheduler that is running the powershell exe script  you can click  Run whether user is logged on or not  and that will never show the powershell window when the task runs

User · Answer

Here s a one-liner   mshta vbscript Execute  CreateObject   Wscript Shell    Run   powershell -NoLogo -Command      amp   C  Example Path That Has Spaces My Script ps1         0   window close     Although it s possible for this to flash a window very briefly  that should be a rare occurrence

User · Answer

You can use the PowerShell Community Extensions and do this   start-process PowerShell exe -arg  pwd foo ps1 -WindowStyle Hidden   You can also do this with VBScript  http   blog sapien com index php 2006 12 26 more-fun-with-scheduled-powershell    Schedule Hidden PowerShell Tasks  Internet Archive  More fun with scheduled PowerShell  Internet Archive     Via this forum thread

User · Answer

I think that the best way to hide the console screen of the PowerShell when your are running a background scripts is this code   Bluecakes  answer    I add this code in the beginning of all my PowerShell scripts that I need to run in background      Net methods for hiding showing the console in the background Add-Type -Name Window -Namespace Console -MemberDefinition    DllImport  Kernel32 dll    public static extern IntPtr GetConsoleWindow      DllImport  user32 dll    public static extern bool ShowWindow IntPtr hWnd  Int32 nCmdShow     function Hide-Console        consolePtr    Console Window   GetConsoleWindow        0 hide      Console Window   ShowWindow  consolePtr  0    Hide-Console      If this answer was help you  please vote to  Bluecakes  in his answer in this post

User · Answer

I was having this problem when running from c   on Windows 7  the  Interactive Services Detection  service was popping up when running a hidden powershell window as the SYSTEM account    Using the  CreateNoWindow  parameter prevented the ISD service popping up it s warning    process StartInfo   new ProcessStartInfo  powershell exe       String Format    -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy unrestricted -encodedCommand    0     encodedCommand        WorkingDirectory   executablePath     UseShellExecute   false     CreateNoWindow   true

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