3 Ways to Enable Telnet in Windows 10 & 11

Despite its vulnerability issues, Telnet is still used by Windows users as a client-server protocol. It is primarily used for initial network hardware configuration, remote access, port testing and forwarding, and other tasks that do not involve transmitting sensitive information.

You can enable Telnet on Windows 10 and 11 computers through the Command Prompt tool or the graphical user interface (GUI). Here, the article will show you several ways to enable Telnet on Windows computers.

Table of Contents

• 1. Enable Telnet on Windows using Control Panel
• 2. Enable Telnet Client using Windows PowerShell
• 3. Install Telnet Client using Command Prompt
• How to check Telnet client status on PC
• All Ways to Enable Telnet on Windows 11 Computer 

1. Enable Telnet on Windows using Control Panel

You can enable Telnet Client using the classic Control Panel. Since this is an optional feature, you can enable it using the Windows Optional Features dialog box. You can use this feature to add or remove other user-optional features on Windows.

To enable Telnet Client using Control Panel:

• Press Win + R to open Run .
• Type control and click OK to open Control Panel .
• In Control Panel, click Uninstall a Program under Programs and Features .

• In the left pane, click Turn Windows feature on or off .

• In the Windows Features dialog box, scroll down and select Telnet Client .
• Click OK and wait for the feature to install. Once installed, restart your PC to apply the changes and enable the feature.

If you need to disable Telnet:

• Open the Windows Features dialog box and uncheck Telnet Client .
• Click OK and wait for the feature to uninstall.
• Click Restart now to restart your PC and apply the changes.

2. Enable Telnet Client using Windows PowerShell

You can use the Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature cmdlet to enable Telnet Client using Windows PowerShell . This is useful if you can't enable the feature using the Windows Features dialog, and it's also faster than the GUI method.

To enable Telnet using Windows PowerShell:

• Press Win + X to open the WinX menu.
• Click Windows Terminal (Admin) and click Yes to open the Terminal app with admin rights. If you are using Windows 10, type PowerShell into Windows Search and open Windows PowerShell with admin rights.
• In the PowerShell window, type the following command and press Enter to enable Telnet:

Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName TelnetClient

• This process may take a few minutes, so wait for it to complete and return a status report. If successful, you will see Online:True as the result.
• If you want to disable Telnet Client, use the following command instead:

Disable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName TelnetClient

• Close PowerShell and restart your PC.

3. Install Telnet Client using Command Prompt

If you prefer Command Prompt over PowerShell, you can use the DISM /Online command to enable optional features on your Windows 11 computer.

Follow these steps to install Telnet using Command Prompt:

• Press the Win key and type cmd.
• Right-click on Command Prompt and select Run as administrator .
• In the Command Prompt window, type the following command and press Enter :

dism /online /Enable-Feature /FeatureName:TelnetClient

• Command Prompt will start enabling the feature and display a message that the operation completed successfully.
• If you need to disable Telnet, type the following command and press Enter :

dism /Online /Disable-Feature /FeatureName:TelnetClient

• Wait for success notification.
• Type exit and press Enter to close Command Prompt.

How to check Telnet client status on PC

You can check if Telnet client is enabled on your PC using Command Prompt command. When enabled, Telnet command will open a new CMD to connect to remote server and perform other tasks.

• Launch Command Prompt with admin rights .
• In the Command Prompt window, type Telnet and press Enter.
• A new CMD with Microsoft Telnet will open.

All Ways to Enable Telnet on Windows 11 Computer

Telnet is a built-in remote access utility that you can use to troubleshoot firewalls and networks. Although it is still part of Windows, system administrators now prefer the more secure SSH protocol for accessing computers over unsecured networks.

The main disadvantage of Telnet is that it is insecure and vulnerable to Man-in-the-Middle attacks . If not in specific situations, switch to more secure network protocols like SSH and Mosh with better passwords and public key authentication.