There are two reasons I can think of not to sign in with a Microsoft account. The first is that you want nothing to do with a Microsoft account, thank you very much. Signing in makes Windows bombard you with more Microsoft 365, OneDrive, and Game Pass subscription upsells since all you need to do is add them to an account that already exists, and Windows setup will offer subscriptions to each if you sign in first.
The second—which describes my situation—is that you do use a Microsoft account because it offers some handy benefits like automated encryption of your local drive (having those encryption keys tied to my account has saved me a couple of times) or syncing of browser info and some preferences. But you don’t want to sign in at setup, either because you don’t want to be bothered with the extra upsells or you prefer your user folder to be located at “C:\Users\Andrew” rather than “C:\Users\.”
Regardless of your reasoning, if you don’t want to bother with sign-in at setup, you have a few different options:
Use the command line
During Windows 11 Setup, after selecting a language and keyboard layout but before connecting to a network, hit Shift+F10 to open the command prompt (depending on your keyboard, you may also need to hit the Fn key before pressing F10). Type OOBE\BYPASSNRO, hit Enter, and wait for the PC to reboot.
When it comes back, click “I don’t have Internet” on the network setup screen, and you’ll have recovered the option to use “limited setup” (aka a local account) again, like older versions of Windows 10 and 11 offered.
For Windows 11 Pro
For Windows 11 Pro users, there’s a command-line-free workaround you can take advantage of.
Proceed through the Windows 11 setup as you normally would, including connecting to a network and allowing the system to check for updates. Eventually, you’ll be asked whether you’re setting your PC up for personal use or for “work or school.”
