Install the GUI on Windows Server 2022/2025 Core (Full Desktop Experience)

Server Core is the recommended default install for most roles — smaller footprint, smaller attack surface, fewer reboots for patching. But sometimes you need the full desktop experience back, whether that’s for a role whose management tools don’t have a solid PowerShell/Core story yet, or just because a specific admin prefers the GUI. Here’s how, on Server 2022 and 2025.

The important caveat first

Unlike Windows Server 2008 R2 and earlier, you cannot add the GUI back on a Server Core install using Windows Update or the feature alone — the GUI binaries are actually removed from Core installations, not just hidden. You need access to the installation media (ISO) for the same Server version and build, because the feature installer pulls the missing files from there.

Check what’s currently installed

From an elevated PowerShell session:

Get-WindowsFeature Server-Gui-Mgmt-Infra, Server-Gui-Shell

If both show as Removed rather than Available, that confirms you’ll need the source media.

Install the GUI, using the ISO as the source

1. Mount the Server 2022/2025 installation ISO (matching your current build number — this matters, mismatched builds will fail).
2. Find the install.wim (or install.esd) inside \sources\ on the mounted drive, and check the index for the Desktop Experience edition:

Get-WindowsImage -ImagePath D:\sources\install.wim

1. Install the feature, pointing at the correct WIM index (commonly the Desktop Experience/Standard/Datacenter-with-GUI index — confirm the number from the previous command’s output for your media):

Install-WindowsFeature Server-Gui-Mgmt-Infra, Server-Gui-Shell -Source wim:D:\sources\install.wim:4 -Restart

1. The server will reboot at least once, sometimes twice, while it finishes installing. Give it time — don’t power-cycle it if it looks stuck for a few minutes during a GUI conversion.

Going the other way (removing the GUI)

If you want to drop back to Core later to reclaim the smaller footprint:

Uninstall-WindowsFeature Server-Gui-Mgmt-Infra, Server-Gui-Shell -Restart

This one doesn’t need source media — removing components never does, only adding them back.

If you don’t have the matching ISO handy

You can also point -Source at a network share or a mounted Windows Server image from Microsoft’s Evaluation Center if you don’t have your original licensed media on hand, as long as it’s the same Server version/edition — the build doesn’t need to be byte-identical, but a materially different build can still fail the source lookup.