Cortana is one of the best features of Windows 10. If you don’t know, Cortana is a digital personal assistant and is similar to personal assistants found in Android (Google Now) and iOS (Siri).
Ever since Cortana was introduced in Windows 10, Cortana is learning new commands with each major update to Windows 10.
Up until now, we could use Cortana to search the web, get directions, add reminders, create an appointment, and a few more things.
Although Cortana is fairly powerful, it didn’t support shut down, restart, hibernate and sleep commands. While there is a workaround to use Cortana to shut down, restart, sign out, restart and sleep Windows 10, it was not a straight-forward job.
Luckily, starting with Windows 10 Fall Creators Update, Cortana allows you restart, shut down, sign out, and lock PC. This means that you can now shut down, sign out, restart and lock your Windows 10 PC using your voice.
Cortana commands to turn off, restart, lock and sign out Windows 10
Here are the commands to shut down, restart, lock and sign out in Windows 10.
IMPORTANT: These Cortana commands are available in 16251 and above builds of Windows 10 Creators Update only.
“Hey Cortana, restart PC.”
“Hey Cortana, turn off PC.”
or
“Hey Cortana, shut down PC.”
“Hey Cortana, lock PC.”
(This command doesn’t ask for confirmation)
“Hey Cortana, sign out.”
For some of these commands, Cortana asks you for verbal confirmation. To be precise, Cortana asks for confirmation, for shut down, restart and sign out commands. When asked for confirmation, please say “Yes” to complete the voice command.
In addition to using these commands from Windows 10 desktop, you can use these commands from the Lock screen. To use Cortana from the Lock screen, please enable Cortana on the Lock screen by navigating to Settings > Cortana > Talk to Cortana.
Please remember that these new Cortana commands are currently available in English only.
Is there a Cortana command to hibernate and sleep Windows 10 PC?
Unfortunately, there is no Cortana command yet to put your computer to sleep and hibernation. If you want to use Cortana to sleep and hibernation, please refer to our Cortana commands to hibernate, sleep, shut down and restart PC workaround guide.
