What are the Best Practices for Using Group Policy Objects?

Using item-level targeting can become a hassle. Instead, apply policies to Organizational Units (OUs) while keeping inheritance in mind. I suggest having a "Default Domain" policy for common settings everywhere, then be more specific with GPOs targeted at different OUs for Users, Servers, and Workstations. Just remember that too many GPOs can slow logon times, and the same goes for having too many items in a single policy.

We have a mix of GPOs at my job. Some are broad with lots of settings, like security baselines for all computers, while others are narrow with just a few settings. It's often unnecessary to cram everything into one policy, but similar settings can coexist.

I personally like to tackle policies one by one. It makes troubleshooting easier since you can pinpoint exactly which policy caused an issue if something goes wrong.

I recommend organizing your GPOs by theme, like Chrome Settings or Windows baseline. This helps keep the number of GPOs down, which is important for avoiding long login times. Just be careful with inheritance and enforcement, and you should be in good shape!

Try to avoid bloated GPOs. Have a few larger ones for baselines, but aim for targeted policies with clear names. If you're struggling to describe a GPO in a few words, you might be adding too many settings. Also, make sure to clean up any unused parts of the GPO and watch for inheritance issues.