Shutdown Windows Using Command Prompt Remotely

An often overlooked command in Windows is to shutdown the computer using command prompt or batch scripting. This can be useful for shutting down a computer remotely, rebooting a computer while logged in via remote desktop or setting a scheduled task to shutdown your pc at a specified time every day

The Shutdown Command

• First click start, then run and type cmd and OK
• This will open command prompt and allow you to input the shutdown command
• Shutdown uses the following syntax:

shutdown [-i | -l | -s | -r | -a] [-f] [-m \\computername] [-t xx] [-c "comment"] [-d up:xx:yy]

Wow! thats confusing, lets break it down into the command and what the switches do

• Typing shutdown without any switches will show you the following list of switches:

• The most common switches to use are
• This will shutdown the computer:

shutdown -s

• This will reboot the computer:

shutdown -r

• This will shutdown the computer after 10 seconds(Default is 30):

shutdown -s -t 10

• This will shutdown the remote computer PC001:

shutdown -s -m \\PC001

• This will shutdown the computer with the comment “autoreboot”:

shutdown -s -c "autoreboot"

Now you know the switches and how to shut off your pc or a remote pc give it a go. Remember that you need administrative permissions on the machine your are shutting down.