Windows 10: Can I use my windows 7 license key in win-11 for activation.

Hello Microsoft Team,I purchased Windows 7 ultimate license copy in 2011 and used it on my old laptop; now, I have bought a new system and want to install Windows 11. Can I use the license key of windows 7 to activate windows on my new PC?Now the old laptop is not in use and its hardware is also obsolete .

:)

 

Windows won't activate a digital license but will with a product key?

Pardon my jumping in...

On the first point: Once you have a digital license on a machine, you don't really need the key again. You could simply reinstall Windows using the generic key. Windows then creates a hash that is unique to your computer. It will look on the Windows activation servers to see if that machine has ever been activated before with the same edition of Windows. If it has, it will auto activate. There is no need to transfer any sort of license or even take any action whatsoever. It's just magic *Smile.

One the final point, regarding usage of license keys for Win 10 and 11. Just to take that point one step further - If you activate a system with Win 10, you can at any time install Windows 11 as well. You can also go the other way around. If you use a license to install Win 11, you could later decide to install Win 10 instead. Even the generic keys are the same for Win 10 and 11. So, those licenses are truly interchangeable because they are one and the same.

Just to illustrate a scenario that is common for me:

Let's say that I have a new computer. I typically like to install by doing a fully automated, unattended install. With an unattended install you use a generic key. For example, I will use the Win 10 / 11 Pro generic key. Because generic keys are NOT activation keys, Windows will not activate automatically after installation. I will have to provide a real Win 10 / 11 Pro key to activate it. At that point a digital license is created and stored on Microsoft servers for my system.

Once activated, I toss that key, knowing that I will never need it again.

Now, assume that I reinstall Windows from scratch again on that same system. If I'm doing an unattended install I provide the generic key (because unattended installation needs some sort of key). If I'm manually stepping through the installation, I simply tell Windows that I don't have a key. I just make sure that I am installing the same edition of Windows (Pro). After installation, Windows checks the Microsoft servers to see if a digital license exists for that machine. If it does, it activates. Note that at no time did I need to reference the original license key or perform any sort of transfer. It just happens automagically.

Hope that helps!

 

activate windows 7 oem key

Is there any way to activate a oem key in a win 7 wich has not been installed with the oem disk? The key is the one wich came with the computer and I installed version that matchs with it, so there wouldn't be any problem of using any other disk of win 7, but it doesn't activate.

 

How to move Win 7 license over to a new rig?

AFAIK, OEM licenses will have a Product ID that usually contain "OEM" within it - it can be found under Control Panel > System > Windows Activation (usually).

Layton