What is max password length allowed in Windows 2016 Active Directory Policy?

Patrick Castor 26

Pen Test recommends setting user passwords to min of 12, Users with Domain Admin access rights to min of 16 and Service Accounts to Min of 20.

Is this possible in Windows 2016 AD Group policy?

A saw a reference that said max is 14 but have not seen any Microsoft Learn that state that.

Andre++ 21 Reputation points

2020-12-24T09:56:44.51+00:00

Minimum or maximum?
The GPMC GUI limits the minimum password length to 14. But you can increase that to 20.
To do that you must enable the RelaxMinimumPasswordLengthLimits Group Policy on all DCs.
More information here: Minimum Password Length auditing and enforcement on certain versions of Windows

Of course, with any setting you can have passwords up to 265 characters in length (supported by both AD DS and Azure AD), though Window 10 login GUI limits it to 127 and if you use a Microsoft account to sign in, it is limited to 16.

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Anonymous

2020-06-25T19:48:13.073+00:00

Still applies but also note on premise Server 2016 is not supported on QnA. They're actively answering question in dedicated forums here.
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windowsserver/en-US/home?forum=ws2016

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Regards, Dave Patrick ....
Microsoft Certified Professional
Microsoft MVP [Windows Server] Datacenter Management

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Patrick Castor 26 Reputation points

2020-06-25T19:52:55.327+00:00

Thanks you
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Anonymous

2020-06-25T19:28:13.423+00:00

Looks like 256 chars
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/active-directory/authentication/concept-sspr-policy

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--------------------------

Regards, Dave Patrick ....
Microsoft Certified Professional
Microsoft MVP [Windows Server] Datacenter Management

Disclaimer: This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties or guarantees, and confers no rights.
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Patrick Castor 26 Reputation points

2020-06-25T19:34:42.88+00:00

That's for Azure in the Cloud. I am in a Windows 2016 Domain based self-hosted environment so I don't think docs for Azure in the apply to my situation or question.

Thanks,
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