Microsoft has released PowerShell Core 7.0 and now you can install it in your computer. It is different from the PowerShell that comes pre-installed with Windows 10. Actually PowerShell Core 7.0 is open-source and is available for not only Windows but also for other platforms like Linux and macOS.
If you install PowerShell Core 7.0 in Windows 10, it does not affect Windows PowerShell that is already installed in your PC. In fact, you can have both Windows PowerShell and PowerShell Core installed in your Windows PC and use them simultaneously. As far as Windows computers are concerned, it is available for Windows 7, Windows 8.1 and Windows 10.
Here is how you can install PowerShell Core 7.0 in a Windows PC:
- Visit https://github.com/PowerShell/PowerShell and download the MSI package which is available for both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions.
- Launch the installer by double-clicking on the MSI file and follow on-screen instructions. During the installation, you can choose to add a context-menu to launch PowerShell Core 7.0 from any folder.
- After the installation has been done, you can launch the new PowerShell Core from the Start Menu by looking up “PowerShell Core 7.0”. You can also check the version by using the familiar command Get-Host | Select-Object Version. It should show version 7.0.
If you had selected to add the right-click menu to Windows File Explorer during the installation, then you can launch PowerShell Core 7.0 just by right-clicking anywhere inside a folder and select PowerShell Core 7 → Open here or Open here as Administrator.
With the release of PowerShell Core 7.0, Microsoft has upgraded .NET Core from 2.0 to 3.1. Earlier version PowerShell Core 6.0 was based on .NET Core 2.0. As a result of this upgrade, many new features which are part of .NET Core 3.1 are now available through PowerShell Core.
You can read more about the release of PowerShell Core 7.0 from Microsoft’s own developer blog at https://devblogs.microsoft.com/powershell/announcing-powershell-7-0/.