How to edit Group Policy settings on Windows 10 Home with Policy Plus

Policy Plus is a standalone tool that allows you to change Group Policy settings on every version of Windows, including Windows 10 Home.

Usually, when you need to change advanced settings on your Windows 10 device, you use the Group Policy Editor (gpedit), but because it’s a feature designed for network administrators, it’s only available on Windows 10 Pro and higher versions. As a result, many Windows 10 Home users end up having to make changes to the Registry to implement the same settings, which could have been more easily configured using the Group Policy Editor.

Policy Plus is an open source app that runs virtually on any version of Windows 10 making it super-easy for anyone to make advanced system settings changes without the Registry hassles. In addition, it has the same look and feel, which means that if you used the Group Policy Editor before, you’ll know how to use Policy Plus right away.

In this guide, you’ll learn the steps to get started with Policy Plus to change advanced settings on Windows 10 Home.

How to use Policy Plus to edit Group Policy settings on Windows 10 Home

It should be noted that at time of the writing Policy Plus is offered as pre-release software, so it may not work as expected. In addition, some antivirus may detect this software as a malware, but it’s not malicious. However, remember that you’ll be using a third-party tool that isn’t supported by Microsoft. Use it at your own risk.

To get started with Policy Plus use the following steps:

1. Download Policy Plus from GitHub (and at the bottom of the page, click the Download a Release build link).

2. Double-click the Policy Plus.exe file to launch the tool (no installation require).

   

3. While you can change a lot of settings out-of-the-box, some administrative templates are missing if you’re running Windows 10 Home. To download the most up-to-date set of policies, click on Help from the file menu, and click the Acquire ADMX Files option.

4. Set a destination folder, but only if you want to change the default location.

5. Click on Begin.

   

After completing the steps, you’ll have access to most of the settings you can configure on Windows 10 Pro, including access to Windows Components to change Windows Update, Sync Settings, OneDrive, Windows Ink Workspace, Microsoft Edge, and a slew of other options.

In order to configure an advanced setting, simply double-click a policy, and select Not Configured, Enabled, or Disabled, and customize the policy as indicated in the description — just like using the Group Policy Editor. Once you’ve completed configuring the policy, you’ll need to restart your computer for the changes to take effect.

If you can’t find a policy, Policy Plus also support search by ID, registry, and plain text. In addition, unlike the Group Policy Editor, on each policy, you also get a drop-down menu to select to edit the policy for User or Computer.

It’s also possible to bring the original Group Policy Editor console to Windows 10 Home using this workaround, but you won’t be able to change as much settings as those offered by Policy Plus.

While we’re focusing this guide on Windows 10 Home, you can also use Policy Plus on Windows 10 Pro, Windows 8.1, and even Windows 7. However, it’s always recommended to use the Group Policy Editor if it’s available to you.