Environment Variables

Environment Variables offers an easy and convenient way to manage environment variables. It allows you to create profiles for managing a set of variables together. Profile variables have precedence over User and System variables. Applying the profile adds variables to User environment variables in the background. When a profile is applied, if there is an existing User variable with the same name, a backup variable is created in User variables which will be reverted to the original value on profile un-apply. Applied variables list shows the current state of the environment, respecting the order of evaluation of environment variables (Profile > User > System). Evaluated Path variable value is shown at the top of the list.

PowerToys Environment Variables screenshot

Edit/Remove variable

To edit or remove a variable (profile, User or System), select the more button (•••) on the desired variable:

PowerToys Environment Variables: Edit/Remove variable

Add profile

To add a new profile:

  • Select New profile
  • Enter profile name
  • Set Enabled toggle to On to apply the profile right after creation
  • Select Add variable to add variables to profile (either new variable or existing User/System variables)
  • Select Save

PowerToys Environment Variables: Add profile

To edit or remove a profile, select the more button (•••) on the desired profile.

Apply profile

To apply a profile, set the profile toggle to On. Only one profile can be applied at a time. The Applied variables list will show applied profile variables at the top (below Path variable):

PowerToys Environment Variables: Apply profile

Settings

From the settings, the following options can be configured:

Setting Description
Open as administrator Allow management of System variables. If off, only profile and User variables can be modified. Environment Variables is opened as administrator by default.