Use cscript to activate Office 2010, 2013 & 2016

Software: Office 2010, 2013 & 2016 | Last modified on 2018-06-18

When you're unable to activate Office through additional means, you can use the
cscript commands to activate Office with the help of the Command Prompt.

[Solution 1] Activate Office with cscript

1. Open the Command Prompt (Admin) or PowerShell (Admin).

2. Execute the command that belongs to your version:

o Office 2010: cd C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office14

o Office 2013: cd C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office15
o Office 2016: cd C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office16

3. To view the installed product key, execute cscript ospp.vbs /dstatus

4. To uninstall an installed product key, execute cscript ospp.vbs /unpkey:XXXXX
Replace the XXXXX with the last five character of the currently installed product key
(found in step 3).
5. To install a new product key, execute cscript ospp.vbs /inpkey:XXXXX-XXXXX-
XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX
Replace the XXXX with your full product key of Office.
6. To activate Office with the new product key, execute cscript ospp.vbs /act
7. Restart the Office application and Office will be activated.

You will have to obtain the product key from within your Microsoft Account if you're
using a retail version of Office 2013 or 2016.

1. Go to http://www.office.com/myaccount.
2. Sign in with your Microsoft Account and select Install from a disc.
3. Open I want to burn a disc and select View your product key.
4. Use this product key for the steps above.
 View or change the Office or Outlook Product Key

I’ve got several licenses for Office and Outlook but I’m not sure which one which ones I’ve used and
which ones are free.

How can I find out which license I’ve used for which computer and how can I change the key if
needed?

While you could simply try one of your Product/License Keys and see if it gets accepted, it’s not a
very sophisticated approach.

The proper method to determine or change the Product Key depends on your version of Office or
Outlook. However, for either version there is no need to completely reinstall Office.

Note: Office 365 installations don’t require a license key as they activate automatically when you log
on to Office with your Microsoft Account.
Determine the Product Key with a 3rd party tool
Determining the used Product Key when using Office 2007 or previous isn’t directly supported by
Microsoft. However, you can use a little program called Magic Jelly Bean Keyfinder to find out your
used Product Key. Simply install and run the application to find out the Product Key (note: during the
installation, there will be a prompt to also install a sponsored application which you can choose not
to install).
Another free application which you can use is Belarc Advisor. This application does a bit more
thorough scan of your computer for which it generates a report that also includes license keys for
several of your installed applications. If you are in a large corporate network, you might want to
disconnect your network connection as it will also try to build a network map which may cause the
application to appear to hang at the “checking the local network of this computer” stage.

Find license keys for Office 2010 and Office 2013 via a script
Magic Jelly Bean Keyfinder doesn’t work for Office 2013 suites and applications. However, Office
2010 and Office 2013 already include a vbs-script which will reveal the last 5 characters of your
Product Key. It’s pretty safe to state that these 5 characters would already be more than enough to
find out which Product Key you have used (as you should already have safely stored the full Product
Key code somewhere else together with your other license information).

You can run the vbs-file in the following way;

1. Open a command prompt. For instance via:

 Start-> All Programs-> Accessories-> Command Prompt
 Windows XP
Start-> Run: cmd
 Windows Vista, Windows 7 and Windows 8
Start-> type: cmd
2. In the command prompt, type the following:
 Office 2010 (32-bit) on a 32-bit version of Windows
cscript "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office14\OSPP.VBS" /dstatus
 Office 2010 (32-bit) on a 64-bit version of Windows
cscript "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office14\OSPP.VBS" /dstatus
 Office 2010 (64-bit) on a 64-bit version of Windows
cscript "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office14\OSPP.VBS" /dstatus
 Office 2013 (32-bit) on a 32-bit version of Windows
cscript "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office15\OSPP.VBS" /dstatus
 Office 2013 (32-bit) on a 64-bit version of Windows
cscript "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office15\OSPP.VBS" /dstatus
 Office 2013 (64-bit) on a 64-bit version of Windows
cscript "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office15\OSPP.VBS" /dstatus
3. You should now get a screen with some license details such as the license name, type and the last 5
characters of the Product Key.

Office 2010 and Office 2013 offer a scripted method to lookup your Product Key.

Changing Product Key for Office XP/2002, Office 2003 or Office 2007
Changing the Product Key for Office 2007 or previous requires you to go into the Registry.
1. Browse to the following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\<version>\Registration
2. Now is a good point to make a backup of that key;
Right click on the key, choose Export… and save the file to for instance your Desktop.
3. Expand the Registration key in the Registry and you’ll see one or more sub keys which contain a lot
of characters between curly brackets: { and }
Each sub key stands for an installed Office application.
The proper name for this identifier string is called a “GUID”.
4. Click on the sub key to reveal its contents in the right pane.
The SuitName key will reveal the name of the package that you have installed. If you have multiple
GUID sub keys listed, you can use this key name to determine for which installation you’ll be
changing the Product Key.
5. In the pane on the right, delete the following keys:
 DigitalProductID
 ProductID
6. Close the Registry and start Outlook (or any other Office application); you’ll now be prompted to fill
in your Product Key and activate Office again.

Delete the DigitalProductID and ProductID key to reset your Product Key.

Changing the Product Key for Office 2010 or Office 2013

Changing the Product Key for Office 2010 or Office 2013 doesn’t require a trip to the Registry and
can be done directly from the Control Panel or via a command line.

To change it via Control Panel, open the “Add/Remove Programs” applet (Windows XP) or the
“Uninstall a Program” applet (Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8 or Windows 10). Locate your
Office 2010/2013 application and press Change. Setup will now start with the option “Enter a
Product Key” which allows you to enter a different product key.

You can also change the Product Key via the OSPP.VBS script. Instead of using the /dstatusswitch,
you must use the /inpkey:value switch where you should replace value for your Product Key.