How to check if your PC can run Windows 11

In June 2021, Microsoft announced the Windows 11, noted that the upcoming Operating System would have more stringent hardware requirements than the Windows 10. If you are looking How to check if your PC can run Windows 11. It released a utility named PC Health Check to permit users to assess if their PC is ready for Windows 11.

However, a few days back, Microsoft has withdrawn the tool from circulation, citing issues with the “level of detail or accuracy.” In other words, it says many users that their hardware could not run Windows 11, but why, it was not telling them in detail.

To partially make up for the loss of the PC’s Health Checker app, Microsoft listed more details about minimum system requirements for Windows 11. It also noted that the requirements might be changed after the company factored in feedback from testers of the Windows Insider program.

Previously, In August 2021, the PC Health Check tool was returned. There is no shortage of third-party options available to those who did like a report on a Computer’s compliance with or violation of the minimum system requirements for Windows 11, which will be rolling out from October 5.

I will walk you through the system requirements as they are given now, how to use the app PC Health Check and two other alternative tools to check a PC’s Windows 11 upgrade readiness.

System requirements for Windows 11

According to Microsoft’s Windows 11 web page, the following items delineate the basic requirements that the PC needs to meet for Windows 11 to install correctly on that machine. At present, Microsoft has relaxed those restrictions to run Windows 11 within the Insider Program out-of-compliance PCs. But after the official release goes out this year, those machines will not be able to upgrade to Latest Windows 11 versions.

Processor: 64bit architecture at 1 GHz or faster; Intel: eight-generation or newer; AMD Ryzen 3 or better; Qualcomm Snapdragon 7c or higher
RAM: 4GB or higher
Storage: 64GB or more storage device
System firmware: UEFI, SecureBoot capable
TPM: Trusted Platform Module version 2.0
Graphics card: Direct X12 or later; WDDM 2.0 driver or newer
Display: High-def (720p) display, more significant than 9″ diagonal in size, 8bits per color channel (or better)
Internet connection/MSA: Windows11 Home edition requires internet connectivity and a Microsoft Account (MSA) to complete the device setup on first use. Switch out of Windows 11 Home in S mode that requires internet connectivity. For all the Windows 11 editions, internet access is needed for updates and to download and use certain features. An MSA is required for some parts as well.

Recently, the company also relaxed the CPU restrictions to include specific high-end seventh generation Intel processors found in the Microsoft Surface Studio 2 PCs and specific Xeon processors. Otherwise, the limitations stated above are unchanged.

Using Microsoft’s PC Health Check

As I write this Article, PC Health Check has been re-released. Still, it’s currently only available to Microsoft’s Windows Insider program members. To download PC Health Check, you must be a registered Windows Insider and logged into the associated Microsoft account. Otherwise, you will get a response from Microsoft Software Download that reads, “To access this web page, you need to be a Windows Insider program” member.

That difficulty overcomes; the download is easy to access as a Microsoft Installer file named (WindowsPCHealthCheckSetup.msi). Run this file, and it will install itself.

Now, type PC Heal into the search box to run the program. Now you can run the app from the Start menu. By clicking on the Check now button inside the “Introducing Windows 11” pane at the top of the app window, to run its built-in Windows 11 compatibility check, as shown below:

The program back to one of the three possible windows after the compatibility check runs. Those who pass the Check get a “meets requirements” message as shown in the below image; those that fail to get a message “doesn’t currently meet” shown into the center on the image, and those from PCs running Windows Education or Enterprise or another Windows version managed by their IT department get a message that reads “Your organization manages updates on this PC” shown on the right, but no compatibility check. I am running Enterprise on my production PC. I have flagged this as an error or problem with Microsoft via its Feedback Hub.

PC of 2014 Surface Pro 3 fails to update because its fourth-generation Intel CPU does not support Windows 11. Some passing grade goes to a 2018 Lenovo ThinkPad X380 Yoga, an eighth-generation Intel CPU, and other required components. Some details for both machines appear in the below image. Tap the See all results button to see more information for both passing and failing PCs.

Microsoft PC Health Check app will work for most Windows PCs. Those running on Windows 10 Education or Enterprise could be out of luck. Same as Windows PC centrally managed via Group Policy in an organization’s IT environment. Here, I also recommend the other two third-party compatibility checker tools in the next section.

Two good alternative Windows 11 compatibility check Tools

How to check if your PC can run Windows 11?

The more options are available, I have found two third-party tools to be very helpful to check your PC for Windows 11 compatibility in more detail to make them necessary:

WhyNotWin11: WhyNotWin11 is a GitHub-based project that runs as a standalone Windows application and reports on the series of checks it performs during a run.
Windows 11 Compatibility Check: It’s a Windows batch file that runs inside the administrative PowerShell session or Commands Prompt window that reports its findings on PC capabilities and attributes.

Any of these tools can provide you general intelligence to determine if your PC is ready and Compatible with Windows 11, with one caveat. Older computers whose CPUs qualify under the processor requirement may include hardware-based TPM (Trusted Platform Module) chips of version 1.3 or older. This processor and CPUs can emulate TPM 2.0, so the software can offset what looks like a failure to meet Windows 11 Compatibility requirements at the hardware level.

1). WhyNotWin11 (How to check if your PC can run Windows 11)

WhyNotWin11 is a GitHub project, and its source code is publicly available. By default, it is residing in the Downloads folder (C:\Users\<username>\Downloads), where you can directly execute the program. Click on the link labeled download the latest stable release, and you will end up with a file named WhyNotWin11.exe.

It takes a little more time to download the WMIC – (Windows Management Instrumentation command-line utility) on which it’s based. When it completes various checks, it displays its results, as shown below images.

Understanding WhyNot11’s output is simple: green meets a requirement, red means it does not, and amber means it may not meet the final requirements but does not meet current needs.

2). Windows 11 Compatibility Check script

How to check if your PC can run Windows 11: The tool, called Windows 11 Compatibility Check, comes from the community website Windows ElevenForum. Their author, J B Carreon, offered his work as freeware. It will come in the form of a batch file called W11CompChk.bat. Downloads for this tool residing on its History page.

How to check if your PC can run Windows 11?

Once it is loaded onto your PC, you can right-click on its entry in File Explorer when holding down the left-hand side Shift key button on the keyboard. On the resulting pop-up menu, select Copy as path. Then, open an administrative Command Prompt window, paste in the string, and remove the trailing quotation marks and Leading (“). These copies are the full file path into your paste buffer.

After that batch file is executed, it can show progress and a report when it completes its various checks. Given image shows results from an incompatible PC, the other photo shows a compatible PC.

Any of these tools will do, but

Microsoft’s PC Health Check get its job done, except for those running on Enterprise or Education versions, those System’s are under central IT management, or some who are not Windows Insiders. Both it and the WhyNotWin11 app are smart enough to check which TPM version is active in the environment of Windows runtime.

Thus, they correctly identify the TPM as compatible with the “version 2.0 or higher” requirement. In other words, if you run the TPM.msc snap-in for the Microsoft Management Console on the available PC (you must be login with administrative privileges), it shows that its “Specification version” is indeed 2.0.

That meets the stated requirement and means that the Lenovo X12 ThinkPad in question (built-in 2021) will happily and successfully run Windows 11.

Note: If you find any wrong information in specs and price, kindly inform us in the comment box.

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How to check if your PC can run Windows 11 – Check Its system requirement