A forgotten Windows password on your own PC is embarrassing, not fatal. Boot a trusted tool from your Ventoy USB, clear or reset the local account password from outside Windows, and sign back in - provided the account is a local one and the disk is not encrypted.
First, the boundary, stated clearly: this is for PCs you own or are explicitly authorised to repair. Resetting a password on someone else's machine without permission is not a repair job, whatever the tool allows. With that settled, the method is a classic of the rescue toolkit: Windows cannot guard its password file while it is switched off, so a tool booted from USB can edit the local account database directly. Here is how it works, and - just as important - where it honestly stops working.
Everything depends on this. A local account exists only on that PC, and its password can be reset offline. A Microsoft account sign-in uses your email address, and its password lives with Microsoft - no offline tool can reset it, and any tool claiming otherwise is lying or selling something. For a Microsoft account, the correct route is Microsoft's own online password reset from another device.
The sign-in screen usually tells you: an email address shown at login means a Microsoft account; a plain user name means local.
chntpw, also bundled with several rescue distributions.BitLocker: if the drive is encrypted, the offline tool cannot even read the account database until the drive is unlocked with its recovery key. Encryption is specifically designed to defeat this kind of outside access.
EFS-encrypted files: if the account had files protected with Windows EFS encryption, forcibly clearing the password can make those files unreadable forever, because their keys were protected by the old password. This is rare on home PCs, but it is the reason professionals ask "is anything encrypted?" before touching the password.
Stop and hand over when the PC belongs to an employer and is managed by an IT department - domain and company-managed accounts follow their own process, and an offline reset can break the machine's trust with the company network. Stop when the drive is encrypted and nobody has the recovery key. And stop, obviously, when the PC is not yours and the owner has not clearly asked you to do this. A good technician's reputation is worth more than one unlocked laptop.
Watch the video for the on-screen walkthrough of the password reset tool inside the rescue toolkit, done step by step on a test PC.
▶️ Watch Full VideoNo. Microsoft account passwords are verified online against Microsoft's servers. Reset them through Microsoft's password reset page from any other device - offline tools cannot touch them.
No. Clearing a local password changes only the sign-in credential; your files and programs stay as they are. The single exception is files protected with EFS encryption, which can become unreadable - see the warning in this guide.
Almost always that the account is a Microsoft account rather than a local one, or that the drive is encrypted and the tool is looking at the wrong place. Check the sign-in screen for an email address - that settles which kind it is.