This is another post for my mental sanity. I keep looking this up again and again. While working on BizTalk Server projects—and in many other scenarios—I often need to verify whether a specific user has access to a file share or its resources. However, I do not want to log off the machine and sign in again using a different account. In some cases, that account does not even have remote desktop access.
So, the main question is simple: how can I run Windows File Explorer as a different user?
📝 One-Minute Brief
A quick reminder on how to run Windows File Explorer as a different user without logging off. Useful for checking file share permissions or testing access scenarios while working on BizTalk Server or other Windows‑based projects.
There are several ways to accomplish this, but if you need to run File Explorer as a different user, the simplest way to accomplish that is by:
- Open the File Explorer, normally as we usually do, and access the following folder:
- C:\Windows
- Scroll down until you find the explorer.exe executable, or search for this file in the search field in the upper-right corner.
- Press the Shift key, then right-click the explorer.exe file and select Run as different user from the context menu.
- In the Windows Security window that appears, you need to specify the user’s name and password under whose account you want to run the application, then click OK.
- After this, a new File Explorer is opened, running under the specified user account.
Any Windows user can run a program in their current session on behalf of another user using RunAs. This feature allows you to run any scripts (.bat, .cmd, .vbs, .ps1), executable files (.exe), or install applications (.msi, .cab) with the permissions of another user without the need to log off and log in to the machine as a different user/credentials.
Hope you find this helpful! So, if you liked the content or found it helpful and want to help me write more, you can buy (or help buy) my son a Star Wars Lego set!
