Skip to main content
  • Place orders quickly and easily
  • View orders and track your shipping status
  • Enjoy members-only rewards and discounts
  • Create and access a list of your products
  • Manage your Dell EMC sites, products, and product-level contacts using Company Administration.

How to Unlock Bitlocker When It Stops Accepting Recovery Keys

Summary: This article contains information regarding a workaround to unlock BitLocker when it stops accepting key inputs to unlock.

This article may have been automatically translated. If you have any feedback regarding its quality, please let us know using the form at the bottom of this page.

Article Content


Instructions

BitLocker may fail to unlock when the key is entered. When the key is entered (even when registered in Active Directory), BitLocker reports the key was accepted and the unlock was successful, but then prompts you to reenter the key again. This behavior then loops.


Work around To Unlock

To terminate this BitLocker recovery loop, BitLocker must be suspended from within WinRE. To do so, follow these steps:
  • On the page where you are asked to enter the recovery key, select the Skip this drive link at the bottom. You should be presented with a menu that will let you get to a command prompt. The sequence is Advanced options > Troubleshoot > Advanced options > Command prompt.
  • In the command prompt, use the following command to check the BitLocker status of the C: Drive:
    • manage-bde -status c:
  • If the status is returned as locked, you must use the following command to unlock it using your recovery password:
    • manage-bde -unlock c: -rp your 48-digit recovery password
  • Once the drive is unlocked, you must use the following command to suspend protection:
    • manage-bde -protectors -disable c:
  • Exit and reboot.
  • The computer should now successfully boot Windows. Once there, use the BitLocker control panel to resume BitLocker protection.

Helpful Links

Additional Information

Recommended Articles

Here are some recommended articles related to this topic that might be of interest to you.


Out of Warranty support Out of warranty? No problem. Browse to the Dell.com/support website and enter your Dell Service Tag and view our offers.

NOTE: Offers are only available for US, Canada, UK, France, Germany, China, and Japan personal computer customers. Server and Storage not applicable.

Article Properties


Affected Product

Alienware, Inspiron, OptiPlex, Vostro, XPS, G Series, G Series, Alienware, Inspiron, Latitude, Vostro, XPS, Fixed Workstations, Mobile Workstations

Last Published Date

21 Nov 2023

Version

9

Article Type

How To