Easy Step-by-Step guide to demote a domain controller using PowerShell for Server 2012 and above
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This article is for you if –
- You wish to demote a domain controller
- You need to find out about demoting a domain controller
- You wish to demote your domain domain controller to a member server
- This is the last member server in your domain and you no longer need the domain
- You have promoted a new domain controller and need to decommission this one
- You are following the Renaming a domain controller guide and wish to demote this domain controller before renaming the new one
Now lets demote a domain controller…
The procedure can be performed using two AD PowerShell cmdlets. Open a PowerShell Admin prompt and run the command as shown below.
1 | Uninstall-ADDSDomainController |
Other parameters can be added to Uninstall-ADDSDomainController to reflect the options that are available in the Active Directory Domain Services Configuration Wizard.
1 | Uninstall-ADDSDomainController -Credential (Get-Credential) -ForceRemoval
|
For a full list of available parameters, use Get-Help Uninstall-ADDSDomainController.
Once the server has been demoted and rebooted, run Uninstall-WindowsFeature to remove the ADDS server role:
1 | Uninstall-WindowsFeature AD-Domain-Services -IncludeManagementTools |
If you try to remove ADDS before demoting the domain controller, PowerShell will return an error.
