Group policy is used to apply settings for a specific group of users, computers, or ou . Group policy updates can take some time even in some cases it may not apply as we expected. Group policy updates are managed via the GPUpdate.exe in every system. By using this command the group policy update can be forced. Also, PowerShell provides the Invoke-GPUpdate command in order to manage and force group policy updates.
Force Group Policy Update via MS-DOS GPUpdate.exe
The gpupdate.exe is used for a long time in Windows operating systems. Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 10, and modern Windows servers provide this tool by default. The gpupdate.exe can be executed via the MS-DOS command prompt. We will opent the command prompt via the Start menu by typing cmd.exe like below.
In the MS-DOS command line use the following command where the /force is used to force gpupdate even there are minor issues.
gpupdate.exe /forceWhen the update is successful we will get the following message.
Some updated policies may require a system reboot with the “Center User policies are enabled that can only run during logon. OK to log off ‘Y/N’?” message. Just type Y and press enter or simply reboot your system in order to apply the updated policies.
Force Group Policy Update via PowerShell Invoke-GPUpdate
PowerShell provides the Invoke-GPUpdate command or cmdlet which is specifically created to manage Group Policies. First we will open the PowerShell command line interface via the Start Menu by typing “powershell” like below.
We will execute the Invoke-GPUpdate command with the -Force parameter like below.
Invoke-GPUpdate -ForceAlternatively, we can update the remote windows computer group policy by forcing it. We will provide the -Computer parameter and remote computer hostname or IP address we want to update.
Invoke-GPUpdate -Force -Computer 192.168.10.10