How to log in to your locked Windows 10 computer

For those of us that have used Windows 7 for a long time, the Windows 10 login mechanism is annoying, and that’s doubly so when your machine is locked. So I’ve made a handy guide that describes the login process for a locked Windows 10 system.

  1. Type your password and press Enter. This obviously doesn’t work, because the first few characters are absorbed by the pretty picture screen before it goes away to show the password prompt box.
  2. Notice that it says you typed the wrong password, so type it again and press Enter. This has the effect of selecting the OK button on the screen that told you about the earlier mistake, so this didn’t work either.
  3. Finally the password box is selected, empty, and ready for your input. So type your password again. This one should work.

So that’s it. If we’re used to Windows 7 just having the password box on the lock screen and just being able to type our password to unlock it, it takes typing the password 3 times under Windows 10. Sometimes form does not triumph over function.

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