Often people get confused about whether to install Windows 10 32 bit version or 64 bit edition on their PC.  They end up installing 32-bit (x86) version of Windows on a 64-bit (x64) CPU or machine. The installation works fine on Computer but it does not permit execution of programs that require 64-bit edition. Windows 10 start giving errors such as “This app can’t run on your PC”.

Windows error
Windows 10 error showing, “This app can’t run on your PC”
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Important information:

64 bit – It can run 64 bit programs smoothly and is backward compatible with 32 bit applications.

32 bit – It can only run 32 bit programs and won’t allow execution beyond that. But it can run 16 bit DOS 3.1 programs. Also, it does not support RAM more than 2 GB.

How do I determine if my CPU hardware supports 64 bit Windows:

1. Download and install CPU-Z program. It is a program that shows detailed information about your CPU, Ram, Motherboard and Graphic card all in one place. Every PC user must have it.

2. After installation, Run CPU-Z from programs, if your User Access Control warns you, click Yes. It will then scan your PC for a few seconds then it show detailed specifications of your machine.

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CPU-Z

3. If you see Instruction set like any of this, AMD64, x86-x64 or EM64T. Congratulations, your system is compatible with 64-bit operating system instructions. You can proceed with installation of new OS without any worry.

How to Upgrade Windows 10 32-bit to 64-bit:

Unfortunately, there is no upgrade tool or software that can change your Operating System instruction set. You will have to backup your data, format your drives and initiate a clean install of Windows 10 64-bit on your PC. You can easily create Windows 10 64-bit Bootable USB or DVD for clean installation. This process will take a while as you’ll have to download the required edition from Microsoft website.

Selecting Window 10 Edition
Selecting the Windows 10 edition, language and architecture
  • Once you create bootable media, insert USD/DVD on your Computer.
  • Perform a machine restart.
  • Access BIOS by Pressing DEL or F12 key (It varies on every motherboard)
  • Set boot device to USB or DVD whichever you made earlier.
  • Press F10 to save changes and exit, your PC will reboot.
  • It will ask you to “Press any key to boot from USB….“, Do it.
  • Windows Setup will begin, select your partition on which you want to install Windows.
  • After the installation is done, Microsoft will automatically activate your Windows 10 64-bit license assuming you previously had 32-bit OS installed. Make sure you have active Internet Connection during the process.

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10 COMMENTS

  1. Does not work always. Had 7 Pro x86… upgraded to 10 and activated…. formatted drive, installed 10 Pro x64 (same disk used to upgrade in the x86 environment) . No activation, m$ support said to install 7 x64, upgrade / activate / install 10 x64.

    to save time, image your failed-to-activate 10 x64, install 7, activate, install 10 & verify activation, then image drive with previous fresh 10 install. BAM ! activated.
    Support will not activate for you if you received the “free” upgrade… they will if you PAY for it tho!

  3. HAH! The program I’m trying to run IS CPU-Z, and I am running 64bit windows 10.
    Cpu-z was working fine 2 days ago, and then a widnows update and BAM, it can’t run -.-

  4. I get this error trying to run executable files that worked on Windows 9x long before 64 bit operating systems existed, and more recently worked on my Windows 7 computer with 64 bits, so Windows 10 is definitely not fully backward compatible with 32 bit applications.

  5. My system is 64 bit compatible and I already have Win 10 32bit loaded. I created and ISO and USB of the 64bit version. When I reboot, I receive a brief message that it is loading set up, but then switches and boots from hard drive. Does the same when I boot from USB. When I tried to execute the setup.exe directly, I get this message: “This app can’t be run on your PC”. Suggestions appreciated.

  6. I am already running a 64 bit windows 10 for the last 6 months. Today I tried to download and install the new browser – Vivaldi 1-. On trying to install as Admin – I got a message that This app can nogt run on this PC. I

  7. I had exactly the same problem as H P Agrawal, after downloading the Vivaldi installer with Chrome (i.e. 64 bit Windows 10, “this app can’t run on this pc”). Then I downloaded the Vivaldi installer with Firefox, and the installer worked fine — weird, but useful to know…

  8. Do a profile recreation. Create a new profile, migrate data and delete the old profile as it is corrupt.

  9. I’m getting this error from trying to install Minecraft (a 32-bit program) on Windows 8.1 64-bit (a 64-bit OS, obviously). I don’t think this “fix” is legit.

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