PowerShell 7.6: New Features and Practical Tips for System Administrators

PowerShell 7.6.2 is the current LTS release as of June 2026. Let’s review the key new features and how to apply them in practice. At the end — what to expect from PowerShell 7.7.

What’s New in PowerShell 7.6

1. Bash-style aliases and macros

You can now define short aliases right in your profile:

Set-Alias -Name ll -Value Get-ChildItem
Set-Alias -Name grep -Value Select-String

2. Improved ConvertTo-Json

The long-standing serialization-depth issue has been fixed. It now works correctly without -Depth.

$data = Get-Process | Select-Object Name, CPU, WorkingSet
$data | ConvertTo-Json -Compress | Out-File processes.json

3. Deferred update notifications

A new setting lets you postpone the update notification when launching via package managers — scripts are no longer interrupted by extra messages.

Practical Tips

Automated disk report

$servers = Get-ADComputer -Filter {OperatingSystem -like "*Server*"} | Select -ExpandProperty Name
$report = foreach ($srv in $servers) {
    Get-WmiObject Win32_LogicalDisk -ComputerName $srv -Filter "DriveType=3" |
    Select PSComputerName, DeviceID,
           @{N='Size GB';E={[math]::Round($_.Size/1GB,1)}},
           @{N='Free GB';E={[math]::Round($_.FreeSpace/1GB,1)}},
           @{N='Free %';E={[math]::Round($_.FreeSpace/$_.Size*100,1)}}
}
$report | Where-Object 'Free %' -lt 15 | Export-Csv disk_alert.csv -Encoding UTF8

AD user inventory

Get-ADUser -Filter * -Properties LastLogonDate, Enabled |
    Where-Object {$_.Enabled -eq $true} |
    Select Name, SamAccountName, LastLogonDate |
    Sort LastLogonDate -Descending |
    Export-Csv users_report.csv -Encoding UTF8 -NoTypeInformation

Installing PowerShell 7.6 on Windows Server

winget install --id Microsoft.PowerShell --source winget

What to Expect from PowerShell 7.7 (preview)

• Loading modules without modifying the profile
• Contextual IntelliSense via PSReadLine
• Built-in MCP server for integration with AI agents
• Entra ID support in SSH

Bottom line: PowerShell 7.6 is a stable LTS worth installing on all management servers. Upgrading from 7.4 is painless.