Share Microsoft Store Games with Family on PC

Question

Ok, this has been an incredibly frustrating experience. I had long ago purchased Minecraft through Mojang, now it's part of Microsoft. I migrated my original game to MS and my kids played it for a while, and then if vanished into the aether. It's no longer accessible through my Microsoft account or Mojang. After communicating with support, I finally gave up and bought Minecraft again, the Windows 10 Java edition, through the Microsoft store - on the premise that online answers here and elsewhere seem to indicate that I can share my copy with my kids so long as they are part of my family group.

Well, after reinstalling the game on their computers, it tells me I have to purchase the copy of minecraft java edition on their computer, of if I login to the windows version, it says "Incompatible with Launcher".

So what I have is this:

Family account is set up
Child has own microsoft child account attached to the family group I created
Child is logged in to their own Win10 PC with their own microsoft account
Latest Minecraft java edition purchased from Microsoft Store, downloaded, and installed on my PC and the child's PC

Problem:

No visible way to share the game with family group
Attempting to access child's install nets either "purchase this game" or "Incompatible with Launcher" when logged in to Minecraft launcher with child's microsoft login.

Question: Can the game be shared on PC? if so, How?

Answer 1

I have the same problem. I bought minecraft for my son on my account. It is not possible to give the game to my son´s family account.

THATS SO PATHETIC microsoft!!!!!

NEVER AGAIN!

Answer 2

I also bought Minecraft from Mojang and it's frustratingly complicated to let my kid play the game. He's 5 years old and I've created a limited family account for him to use but I'm not going to buy another copy of the game so he can play it...

Minecraft is the only game I have that's using Microsoft Account authentication and I'm not going to buy a single game from Microsoft untill I can share my games to my family.

Steam is lightyears better with this and I've shared my Steam games to my family account without any problems.

Answer 3

I have the same question. After reading this and other posts, it came to me that it is not possible to buy on parent's computer and share on kid's computer. It is ok that MS wants to make money. However the technical support is so crap. The answer is always the old article which is misleading and useless.

Answer 4

Hi JWagner-6245,

It’s not possible to share the game. You will need to purchase two copies of Java edition so two people can play together at the same time.

I hope this answers your question.

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