Is your Windows Hello broken on the latest Windows 11 Preview? Here's a quick fix.

How-to
By Daniel Rubino
published

Is your Windows Hello face camera broken after the latest Windows 11 release? It's a known issue, and there's a simple fix.

Windows Hello on Razer Blade Stealth
Windows Hello on Razer Blade Stealth (Image credit: Daniel Rubino / Windows Central)

Windows 11 build 22000.100 was released yesterday to Windows Insiders on the Dev Channel. With it came a larger rollout of Teams Chat and further changes to the UI to make it all consistent ahead of the expected October release for the new OS.

Being an Insider build, some things broke for some users, and one of those is Windows Hello Facial recognition. Specifically, you will see the error message "Something went wrong" when your lock screen engages, or the PC is locked after a reboot.

Luckily, this issue is a known problem as Microsoft lists both it and the fix in its long list on its blog. (Another known issue is Settings will crash when clicking "Facial recognition (Windows Hello)" under Sign-in Settings if Windows Hello is already set up.)

Lesson: always read the release notes!

The fix is actually very simple to get Windows Hello working again. Here's what you need to do:

  1. Type "Device Manager" into Search (Start Menu or Search icon)

Device Manager (Image credit: Windows Central)
  1. Open Device Manager
  2. Double click on "Biometric devices"
  3. Right-click on "Windows Hello Face Software Device"

Device Manager Windows Hello (Image credit: Windows Central)
  1. Choose "Uninstall device"
  2. Reboot the PC

What this trick is doing is removing the old driver and forcing it to reinstall when Windows reboots. Once the driver is reinstalled, your Windows Hello Face recognition should be good to go.

Need more? Our help and how to section is chock full of guides on other common Windows and hardware fixes, so make sure to check it out.

Daniel Rubino
Daniel Rubino
Editor-in-chief

Daniel Rubino is the Editor-in-chief of Windows Central. He is also the head reviewer, podcast co-host, and analyst. He has been covering Microsoft since 2007, when this site was called WMExperts (and later Windows Phone Central). His interests include Windows, laptops, next-gen computing, and watches. He has been reviewing laptops since 2015 and is particularly fond of 2-in-1 convertibles, ARM processors, new form factors, and thin-and-light PCs. Before all this tech stuff, he worked on a Ph.D. in linguistics, watched people sleep (for medical purposes!), and ran the projectors at movie theaters because it was fun.