After installing the August 2026 preview updates on a Windows 11 25H2 machine, I noticed that WMIC is no longer available. Microsoft says the WMIC utility is being removed from Windows 11 24H2 and 25H2 and will no longer be offered as an optional Feature on Demand, although WMI itself remains supported. I still have a few scripts and tools that depend on WMIC, and I would prefer to keep the utility available if possible. Is there an official way to reinstall it, or can wmic.exe and its dependencies simply be copied from another system?
4 Answers
Copying wmic.exe from another computer is not a reliable or supported restoration method. It may depend on components or behavior that are no longer included, and it could break after future updates. For scripts that cannot be migrated immediately, test them in a controlled environment, but plan to replace WMIC rather than trying to preserve it permanently.
For most inventory tasks, PowerShell is the direct replacement. For example, to retrieve a device serial number, use: (Get-CimInstance Win32_BIOS).SerialNumber. Other WMIC queries can usually be converted by selecting the corresponding WMI or CIM class and properties.
The removal has been announced for a long time, and it is now being treated as final for current Windows 11 client releases. Any replacement should be based on the specific WMIC command: many map cleanly to Get-CimInstance, while more complicated commands may need a short PowerShell script.
There is no supported way to reinstall WMIC once it has been removed from these Windows versions. Microsoft has been deprecating it for years, so the practical solution is to update the scripts to use PowerShell CIM cmdlets such as Get-CimInstance. WMI remains available; only the old command-line client is being removed.
That makes sense for new scripts, although some older tools still expect the Win32-style WMIC interface and may need more than a simple command substitution.
Get-CimInstance is generally preferred over the older Get-WmiObject cmdlet, which is retained mainly for compatibility. The CIM cmdlets work with the same underlying WMI classes.