Command Prompt? Power Shell? Terminal? What’s the Difference? Which Do I Want?

The evolution of command-line interfaces.

There’s a very good chance you’ll never need a command-line interface in Windows. However, on occasion, particularly when diagnosing or tweaking your system, there are certain things that are more easily done using one. In rare cases, a command-line interface might be the only way to accomplish some obscure tasks.

Depending on your setup, you might see one of three separate options in the alternate (right-click) Start menu:

• Command Prompt
• Windows PowerShell
• Terminal

They’re all command-line interfaces, but of course, they’re different. Sort of.

Let’s examine what they are, what you can control, and which you might want to use.

Command? PowerShell? Terminal?

Command Prompt is the old, simple command line. PowerShell is newer and more powerful, mainly for advanced users. Terminal is a wrapper that can run both, plus others, in tabs. For most folks, using Terminal with Command Prompt is enough unless you need PowerShell’s extra features.

Windows Command Prompt

Occasionally, inaccurately, and somewhat fondly referred to as the “DOS box” or “MS-DOS”, the Command Prompt has been in Windows since the beginning. It mimics the older MS-DOS command line interface.

You use it by typing in commands, like “DIR” for a directory listing, among many others, followed by the Enter key to run the command you just typed. Its syntax (or language rules) and basic commands go all the way back to MS-DOS. It’s been refined quite a bit since then.

The default prompt — “C:\Users\askle>” above — indicates which folder (AKA directory) is the current folder: C:\Users\askle.

You can also run Command Prompt by clicking the Start button, searching for “CMD”, and clicking on the words Command Prompt.

You can also type +R and run “cmd”.

Windows PowerShell

Windows Command Prompt is powerful, but it has limits. As a result, Microsoft created a new command-line interface called PowerShell.

It’s a command-line interface, just like Command Prompt, meaning you type in commands and press Enter to run them. The difference is that PowerShell is similar to, but not compatible with, Command Prompt. Some things that work in Command Prompt work differently in PowerShell, and there are many things in PowerShell that you can’t do in Command Prompt at all.

PowerShell lives up to its name: power. It includes a more powerful scripting (programming) language and significantly more direct access to Windows programs, settings, and other internal aspects of the OS. It’s intended to run fairly advanced system configuration, maintenance, and manipulation scripts.

The default prompt — “PS C:\Users\askle>” above — is exactly like Command Prompt’s, with the addition of a leading “PS” to indicate you’re in PowerShell.

You can also run PowerShell by clicking the Start button, searching for “powershell”, and clicking Windows PowerShell when it appears.

You can also type +R and type “powershell”.

Windows Terminal

Terminal wraps Windows Command Prompt and Windows PowerShell together and adds even more.

With its tabbed interface, Terminal runs either Command Prompt, Windows PowerShell, or both, as shown above. Depending on the software you have installed, there may be additional command-line interfaces available. On my computer, that list includes the following; your computer will be different.

• “Azure Cloud Shell” – something Microsoft seems to push, but is not useful for average users.
• “Git Bash” – the “bash” command line shell is familiar to Linux users, as it’s the default command-line interface on most Linux distributions. It’s part of the “git” source code control tools I have installed.
• “Ubuntu” – another instance of a bash shell associated with the Ubuntu Linux subsystem I have installed.

In Terminal’s settings, you can choose which tools (Command Prompt, PowerShell, or something else) open by default when you start Terminal.

You can also run Terminal by clicking the Start button, searching for “terminal”, and clicking Terminal when it appears.

You can also type +R and run “terminal”.

Controlling what’s available

In current versions of Windows 11, you’ll find Terminal in your alternate Start menu. In Terminal, you can use any command-line interface.

Windows 10 defaults to the Windows Command Prompt, but there’s a setting that allows you to change that to PowerShell.

You can also install the Windows Terminal app from the Microsoft Store, though this may not affect the alternate Start menu. You can run it in the other ways I described above.

What to use?

I use Terminal. Since I’m old-school, I have it open the Windows Command Prompt. It’s what I’m used to, and compared to other command-line processors, it’s probably the simplest.

Open the wrong one? Here’s a simple trick to switch.

• If you’re in PowerShell and want Command Prompt, run “cmd”.
• If you’re in Command Prompt and want PowerShell, run “powershell”.

Each will open in the existing command line window.

You may have to type “exit” twice when you’re done: once for each.

To Admin or not to Admin

Whichever command-line interface appears in your Start menu is listed twice.

Without “(Admin)”, the tool runs with your current privilege level. Even if your account is administrator-capable, it’ll run with limited privileges. Sensitive operations may fail or prompt you with the UAC dialog.

Running the “(Admin)” version will first prompt you with the UAC dialog but run with full administrative privileges thereafter.

Which one you want depends on what you’re attempting to do. Unless instructed otherwise, or if you’re not sure, use the non-admin version of the tool.

Podcast audio

Download (right-click, Save-As) (Duration: 12:05 — 11.1MB)

Subscribe: RSS