System Enable or Disable Retail Demo Experience Mode in Windows 11

This tutorial will show you how to turn on or off the retail demo experience mode on a Windows 11 PC.

The retail demo experience mode is only meant for retail store use to allow Windows devices to go into a demonstration environment so customers can see the features of Windows 11.

If you've ever walked into Best buy or any other computer store in your area, you'll notice them running Windows devices which have very generic user names like "Darrin DeYoung".

References:

You must be signed in as an administrator to turn on or off retail demo experience mode.

You must be connected to the Internet to switch to retail demo experience mode.

If you are joined to a domain (work or school), you will not be able to switch to retail demo mode until you leave the domain.

EXAMPLE: Demo Hub that provides feature information in retail demo experience mode

Turning on the retail demo experience mode will erase everything on the PC and restore the PC to factory default settings.

1 Open Settings (Win+I).

2 Click/tap on System on the left side, and click/tap on Activation on the right side. (see screenshot below)



3 Click/tap on the Windows 11 edition name five times. (see screenshot below)


4 Click/tap on Change to confirm. (see screenshot below)


5 Perform one of the following actions you want: (see screenshot below)

• Enter your Retail Access Code (RAC), select the Retailer SKU or Item# and Retailer store ID, click/tap on Next, and go to step 6.
  

  “SKU” is optional and is only required if the retailer associated with the Retail Access Code (RAC) explicitly designed an experience under a specific SKU. The RAC (Retail Access Code), SKU, and Retailer store ID only apply and are only used by Retailers. If this applies to you, the codes should be requested through your Microsoft Account Manager. A list of SKUs will only be available if the retailer associated with the Retail Access Code (RAC) has previously provided it to Microsoft with this intent. If a SKU is not entered, the device will get content specific to the retailer and specific to the model of the hardware.

• Click/tap on Advanced configuration, and go to step 6.
• Click/tap on Skip, and go to step 7.

6 Select the automatic shutdown times you want to use for this device, and click/tap on Next. (see screenshot below)


7 Perform one of the following actions you want: (see screenshots below)

• Turn on Permanently remove admin access automatically after the time specified, select when to Remove admin access after in the drop menu, and click/tap on Finish.
• Turn off Permanently remove admin access automatically after the time specified, enter an Administrator password you want to use, and click/tap on Finish.

8 Retail demo setup will reboot the device soon after the desktop appears, and then retail demo configuration will continue in the background until the device begins showing the video attract loop. (see screenshot below)

This is the default setting.

1 Open Settings (Win+I).

2 Click/tap on System on the left side, and click/tap on Activation on the right side. (see screenshot below)



3 Click/tap on the Windows 11 edition name five times. (see screenshot below)


4 Click/tap on Advanced configuration. (see screenshot below)


5 Click/tap on Remove. (see screenshot below)


6 Click/tap on Confirm. (see screenshot below)


7 The computer will now restart to turn off the retail demo experience mode.

8 When finished, you can now continue at step 13 here to finish setting up Windows 11. (see screenshot below)



That's it,
Shawn Brink