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VeAWD's avatar
VeAWD
Iron Contributor
Aug 07, 2025

Windows 11 upgrade failed as it says "The PC must support TPM 2.0"

I have a powerful gaming PC built a few years ago with an Intel i7 8th gen processor, 16GB RAM, RX 560 4G graphics card and 512GB SSD. This error pops up when I was planning to upgrade Windows 10 to ...
Update management
securenerds's avatar
securenerds
Copper Contributor
Dec 27, 2025

I totally understand your frustration - the TPM 2.0 requirement has stopped a lot of perfectly good computers from upgrading to Windows 11. The good news is there are actually several workarounds you can try to get past this limitation.

First - Check if You Actually Have TPM:

Before trying workarounds, it's worth checking if your PC already has TPM but it's just disabled:

  1. Press Win + R, type tpm.msc and hit Enter
  2. If it shows TPM 1.2 or 2.0, you just need to enable it in BIOS

Important: Many manufacturers actually added firmware-based TPM (fTPM for AMD or PTT for Intel) to their motherboards, but it's disabled by default. You might just need to:

  • Enter your BIOS settings (usually by pressing F2, F10, Del, or F12 during startup)
  • Look for "TPM", "fTPM", "PTT" (Platform Trust Technology), or "Security Device" in the settings
  • Enable it and save changes

Also worth trying: Update your BIOS to the latest version from your manufacturer's website. Sometimes older BIOS versions don't show the TPM option at all, but updating makes it visible in the settings. This is especially common on systems from 2016-2018.

If TPM Really Isn't Available - Registry Method:

If your system genuinely doesn't have TPM hardware, you can bypass the check during installation:

  1. When you hit the "This PC can't run Windows 11" error, press Shift + F10 to open Command Prompt
  2. Type regedit and hit Enter
  3. Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\Setup
  4. Right-click Setup → New → Key, name it LabConfig
  5. Inside LabConfig, create these DWORD (32-bit) values (right-click → New → DWORD):
    • BypassTPMCheck with value 1
    • BypassSecureBootCheck with value 1
    • BypassRAMCheck with value 1
  6. Close everything, hit back, and continue the installation

Alternative - Pre-Installation Registry Edit:

If you're trying an in-place upgrade, you can also:

  1. Press Win + R, type regedit
  2. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\Setup\MoSetup
  3. Create a DWORD called AllowUpgradesWithUnsupportedTPMOrCPU and set it to 1
  4. Run the Windows 11 setup again

I actually came across this helpful article that covers the whole process in detail: https://geeksbrisbane.com.au/blog/windows-11-upgrade-service/ - they explain the TPM situation pretty well and offer some solutions if you're not comfortable doing it yourself.

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