How to uninstall software by Group Policy (GPO)

There are several ways to uninstall applications via GPO:
1. standard gpo tools are limited to msi and what is already installed via gpo
2. PowerShell. The tool is quite complex and time consuming.
3. exe installer that starts the removal process, wrapped in an msi package.
In this article, we will talk about the 3rd method.

Quick video about “Uninstall gpo”

Msi for uninstall programs through gpo

Usually we use msi for install software, but Silent Install Builder can create msi with settings for unistall, windows, programs, etc.
Silent Install Builder will help build msi.

Run the tool and perform the following steps:
1.Create a package
2.Click “Uninstall”
3.Click “add”
4.Click “Uninstall Application”
5.Click Uninstall key “…”

Select Application

Silent Install Builder 6 does not define a silent installation key, so we record a ui recorder script.
Select “UI Avtomation script” and click “Record”

Follow the Silent Install Builder instructions to record all the steps.

The result of recording all the steps looks like this. Click OK.

Now the most important thing, we can build msi to remove software via gpo

It remains to add msi to gpo.
We solved the issue of uninstalling software via gpo.

We briefly list the pros and cons of this method.

One of the main advantages is simplicity and speed.
Cons: binds msi to the Silent Install Builder 6 product.
Everyone chooses for himself what is more important: rapid deployment of software or writing scripts and then testing them on their own.

Sometimes it happens that the script grows to such a size that deleting in this way becomes simply inconvenient and dangerous through gpo.
For these reasons, we have added software uninstallation to Silent Install Builder 6 in such a way that the system thinks the user is uninstalling the software.

Download Silent Install Builder 6
Download Silent Install Builder 5