I cant get back into an admin account on my asus notebook

Question

I just bought this laptop from a friend and she didnt reset it before handing it over. I was deleting anything that had her name or info attached and decided to remove her as the admin and add myself. I did this from her account because it was the only admin account and i didnt take the time to make sure i could login to my account before i dropped her and changed my account to the only admin account. I restart and try to sign into my account to find a 2 factor authentication needed. This wouldnt be a problem but for some reason when i put my pone number in to get a code it tells me this methdod cant be used at this time try something else. I already used my other email so the phone number is all i have left. My iphone that has the authenticator app is out of order right now until i can fix the screen so im trying to figure out how to add an admin acount to this asus notebook running windows 11 home without being logged into an admin account.

Answer 1

Because there is currently no working administrator account that can sign in, the only supported option in this scenario is to reset Windows on the device.

For local accounts, Microsoft documentation states that if there is no other administrator account available to change or reset the password, the device must be reset:

"If you don't have an administrator account to use for changing the password, you will need to reset your Windows device. For more information, see Reset your PC."

On a used PC where the previous owner’s admin account is no longer accessible and the new admin account cannot complete sign-in (because of MFA or other sign-in issues), this effectively means:

1. Back up any personal files that are still accessible from a standard/non-admin account (if any).
2. Perform a Windows reset (Remove everything) so the device is returned to a clean state and a new administrator account can be created during setup.

There is no supported way in the provided documentation to add or elevate an administrator account on that PC without successfully signing in to at least one existing administrator account.

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References:

• Change or reset your password in Windows
• Troubleshoot Problems Signing In to Windows