[Guide] How to View All Programs Installed in Windows 10

[Guide] How to View All Programs Installed in Windows 10

/ Shayne Sherman

If you are a Windows 10 user, you may have noticed that sometimes it can be challenging to keep track of all your open programs. With the ability to multitask, having several windows open at once is easy, and finding a particular program or window can become frustrating.

There are several ways to view all open programs and windows on your Windows 10 computer, allowing you to switch between them and improve your productivity quickly. In this article, we will discuss some methods you can use to view all programs on Windows 10, making it easier for you to stay organized and efficient.

Why Should You View All Programs

  • Improved Productivity: Viewing all open programs and windows on your Windows 10 computer can improve your productivity by allowing you to switch between them quickly and efficiently without wasting time searching for a particular window.
  • Enhanced Organization: By seeing all open programs and windows in one place, you can better organize your work and prioritize your tasks accordingly. This can help you stay focused and on track throughout the day.
  • Accessibility: The ability to view all open programs and Windows on Windows 10 is a built-in feature, meaning you don’t need to download or install any additional software to access it.

View Installed Apps and Programs on Windows 10 via the Start Menu

To access a list of all the programs installed on your computer, you can either click on the Start button or press the Windows key, which will bring up the Start menu displaying all available programs.

windows start menu button

View All Download Apps and Programs via File Explorer in Windows 10

1. Press the Windows logo key and the “R” key on your keyboard simultaneously to open the Run command box.

run command window

2. Type “Shell:AppsFolder” into the Run box and hit Enter.

shell appsfolder

3. The Applications folder will open, displaying all installed programs and apps.

applications folder icons

Access All Installed Programs and Apps via Settings in Windows 10

To see a list of all the applications installed on your Windows 10 device, including default applications, apps downloaded from the Microsoft Store, and classic desktop programs, navigate to the Settings menu, click “Apps,” and then select the “Apps & features” page.

apps and features options

View All Uninstallable Programs on Windows Device

You can use Windows’s Programs and Features utility to see a list of installed programs that can be uninstalled. Here are the steps to access this utility:

  1. To access the Start menu, press the Windows key on your keyboard.

2. Type “Control Panel” into the search bar and press Enter.

windows search control panel

3. Click the “Uninstall a program” link under the “Programs” section.

select uninstall a program option

4. If you use the Small or Large icons view in the Control Panel, look for the “Programs and Features” option.

5. In the Programs and Features window, you can uninstall any of the programs you see listed.

uninstall program

6. To view the programs installed with Windows, click the “Turn Windows features on and off” link on the left of the Programs and Features window.

Remember, this utility is available on Windows Vista, 7, 8, 10, and 11.

View All Programs Installed on a Mac

Look for the Finder icon on the Dock at the bottom of the screen. The Dock is usually at the bottom of the screen and contains frequently used application icons.

  1. Click on the Finder icon to open the Finder window.
mac finder icon

2. On the left side of the Finder window, under the “Favorites” section, click on the “Applications” selector. This will display a list of all the applications installed on your Mac.

3. Scroll through the list to find the application you want to launch.

mac applications list

That’s it! You should now see a list of all the applications installed on your Mac.

View a List of Installed Programs With the Command Prompt and Wmic

To obtain a list of installed programs on Windows, you can use the WMIC command line utility, which accesses the WMI namespace. Follow these steps:

1. Open an elevated Command Prompt by searching for it and running the app as an Administrator.

run command prompt administrator

2. Type the following command: wmic product get name,version and press Enter.

3. Wait a moment, and a table will appear with the names and versions of the programs installed on your system.

4. You can also use WMIC to query remote computers via WMI. To list the applications installed on a remote host, use the following command: wmic /node:NyPC211swd product get name, version, vendor

5. To export the list of programs to a text file, run the following command: wmic product get name,version /format:csv > C:InstalledApps_%Computername%.csv. This will generate a CSV file with your computer name in the title. Open the C drive to locate the file. The list includes the installed programs’ names, versions, and computer names. You can open this file using a text editor or Excel.

wmic node nypc211swd

6. In modern versions of Windows, you can generate an HTML report using WMIC by typing the following command: wmic /output:c:IstalledApps.htm product get Name, Version, Vendor /format:htable. This will create a convenient report you can view in your preferred browser.

html report using wmic

View Installed Programs Using Registry and Powershell

powershell window

Querying the registry is a useful method for finding all installed programs in Windows 10 and Windows 11. You can easily create a list of installed software by combining the registry with PowerShell, a task automation tool.

To start, search for Windows PowerShell in your system and right-click on the result to select “Run as administrator”.

windows powershell

Your computer may have a policy preventing you from running scripts, so we must change that first. Type in the following:

Set-ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted

set executionpolicy unrestricted

Press “A” to select “Yes to All”. Once done, you may want to repeat this step and press “N” to return to the default state.

type y set executionpolicy unrestricted

Next, enter the following command, which comes from a Microsoft scripting blog:

Get-ItemProperty HKLM:\Software\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall* | Select-Object DisplayName, DisplayVersion, Publisher, InstallDate | Format-Table -AutoSize

Press Enter to execute the command.

This command will generate a list of all programs installed on your local machine, including their version number, publisher, and installation date (if available).

You can highlight the list by clicking and dragging, then use Ctrl + C to copy it to another program, such as Notepad or Excel, to save the list.

View Installed Programs Using Windows Settings

apps and features options

To view a list of all programs installed on your computer, including pre-installed Windows Store apps, press the Windows key and “I” key simultaneously to open the Settings app. From there, click “Apps” and then select “Apps & Features”.

To capture the list, use the “Print Screen” key on your keyboard to take a screenshot. If the list is too long to fit in a single screenshot, you may need to scroll down and take multiple screenshots. To make it easier to save the list, you can paste each screenshot into a word processor and save it as a single file. Another option is to paste the screenshots into an image editing program like Paint.

View Installed Programs Using UninstallView

all programs in uninstallview

UninstallView, a software developed by NirSoft, is helpful for uninstalling programs and creating a dependable list of your installed programs.

To use UninstallView, download the executable file and open it. The program will display a list of all your programs. If you want to include Windows Apps in the list, go to the “Options” dropdown and toggle the option.

To view an HTML export of the list, go to “View” and select “HTML Report – All Items.” The file will be saved in the default location as indicated in the address bar. Alternatively, press Ctrl + S to save it in another location.

View Installed Programs Using CCleaner

all programs in ccleaner

CCleaner is a Windows program that can help free up space on your PC, although its reputation has recently been questioned. Nonetheless, it can be used once to generate a list of installed programs on your PC, which can then be saved to a text file.

After installing CCleaner, open the program and select “Tools” from the left menu. Then, click the “Save to text file” button in the lower-right corner. On the “Save As” dialog box, choose the folder where you want to save the installed programs list, enter a file name, and click “Save.”

The list of installed programs includes details such as the company, installation date, size, and version number for each program. The text is tab-delimited, making it difficult to read in a text editor.

Convert Programs Into an Excel Worksheet

all programs in excel worksheet

To import the text file into Excel, first open Excel, then go to File > Open > Browse. Next, change the dropdown next to “File name” to All files and navigate to the location where the text file was saved. Select the text file and click Open.

In the Text Import Wizard dialog box, select “Delimited” under “Choose the file type that best describes your data” on the first screen and click Next. Select the “Tab” delimiter option on the second screen and click Finish. This will import the list of programs into columns on an Excel worksheet.

View Installed Programs Using Geek Uninstaller

all programs in geek uninstaller

Geek Uninstaller, a portable and free Windows application, allows users to uninstall unused or stubborn programs and generates and saves a list of installed programs on a PC.

Upon opening the downloaded executable, the main window of Geek Uninstaller displays a list of installed programs.

To save the list to an HTML file, simply press Ctrl + When the Save As dialog box appears, you can choose the destination folder where you would like to store the list of installed programs. Next, provide a filename for the list and click the Save button to save your changes. The HTML file automatically opens in the default browser and includes each program’s name, size, and installation date.

Moreover, Geek Uninstaller lets users view a list of apps installed from the Windows Store. However, note that this list is separate from the regular Windows programs list and cannot be combined with it. To export this list to an HTML file, follow the same steps.

Lastly, while using Geek Uninstaller to generate the program list, it’s worth considering uninstalling unnecessary Windows programs and apps.

View Installed Programs Using Belarc Advisor

To list all the programs installed on your Windows 10 or 11 computer, you can use the Belarc Advisor program. This utility is free for personal purposes and generates a report on your hardware and software.

Once you have installed and run Belarc Advisor, it will produce the report and automatically open it in your web browser. Look for the “Software Versions and Usage” section and scroll down.

In this section, you will see a comprehensive list of all the software installed on your computer and the version number. By hovering over the “i” symbol next to each line, you can access additional information, such as the program’s file size. You can also click on the symbol to view the folder and file structure of the program. Belarc Advisor marks each software with an indicator that shows the last time it was used. You can find this key at the bottom of the program list.

Create a Comprehensive List of Installed Applications in Windows 10

load windows apps option

To generate a list of all installed apps in Windows 10, you can use a free tool called UninstallView, which does not require installation. Simply download UninstallView from the official website and run it. By default, UninstallView displays only win32 apps, but you can also toggle it to show apps from the Microsoft Store.

Launch UninstallView and wait for it to generate the list. If you want to generate a list of all installed apps with all the details, skip the next step. However, if you only want a list of installed programs in an editable text file, follow these steps:

  1. Click on View and then Choose Columns.
choose columns

2. In the new window, select Deselect all and then choose Display name.

deselect all in uninstall view

3. This will leave only a list of app names.

4. Press Control + A and then Save Selected Items.

save selected items in uninstallview

5. Name the text file and save it where you want. You now have a complete list of all applications installed on your PC in an editable text format.

apps list in text format

Create a List of Installed Microsoft Store Apps

To generate a list of Universal Windows Platform (UWP) apps installed for the current user, execute the following command in PowerShell:

Get-AppxPackage | Select Name, PackageFullName |Format-Table -AutoSize > c:docslist-store-apps.txt

appslist in text format

For a list of all Windows Store apps installed on the device for all users, run the following command in PowerShell:

Get-AppxPackage -AllUsers | ftName, PackageFullName -AutoSize

Note that these commands will only generate a list of UWP apps, not desktop programs. The resulting list can be saved as a text file for future use or editing.

Get a List of Installed Apps in Windows via New Get-Package Cmdlet

The methods described above for obtaining a list of installed programs on Windows have limitations. Some may not display UWP applications, user profile apps, or x64 programs, and others, such as wmic, Get-WmiObject, and Get-CimInstance cmdlets may be slow. However, in recent versions of Windows, including Windows 10/11 and Windows Server 2022, you can use the new Get-Package cmdlet from the PackageManagement module, which is more universal.

This cmdlet is advantageous because it can retrieve information about apps from all installed package providers on the computer. You can see a list of available providers using the Get-PackageProvider cmdlet, which may include Chocolatey, winget, and PSModule. Once these providers are installed, the Get-Package cmdlet can return all apps deployed using the new providers.

To list all installed programs, run the PowerShell command “Get-Package,” which will display desktop apps, apps installed via MSI packages, installed Windows Security Updates (MSU), available PowerShell modules, and Microsoft Store apps.

You can also display specific columns containing information about the installed program and save the list of programs to a CSV file using the Export-Csv cmdlet. To display only programs installed via a specific provider, use the -ProviderName parameter followed by the provider’s name.

If you want a list of installed programs on a remote computer, use PSRemoting with the Invoke-Command cmdlet.

Conclusion

In conclusion, there are several ways to view all programs on Windows 10. Each of the methods mentioned in this conversation has its advantages and disadvantages. While some methods involve built-in tools, others require third-party software. However, all of them can provide a comprehensive list of programs installed on your PC. It is essential to choose the method that works best for you based on your preferences and requirements. By following these steps, you can easily view all programs on your Windows 10 PC, making it easier to manage your software and free up valuable storage space.

Shayne Sherman
Meet the author

Shayne is an expert on all things Microsoft Windows and computer security. As a Windows user of over 30 years, he has been featured on Business Insider, Yahoo, Tech Republic, Hacker Noon, Techopedia, and many other publications. Aside from entertaining at his home theater, he enjoys spending time with his family, including his English bulldog, Fergie.