Fix: Missing Group Policy areas from Group Policy Editor

When it comes to manage multiple machines, Group Policy is one of the best tool for IT Pros. It helps you to quickly push a setting on client’s machine and control their system with the way you want. Microsoft is continuously releasing new GPO templates to manage new features on your client machine or organization. Recently, we came around an issue that you may face with Group Policy. In this case, we observed missing Group Policy areas from Group Policy Editor.

Usually, you can use Group Policy Editor in standalone machine or on a domain machine. On standalone machine, you use Local Group Policy Editor while at AD level, you use Group Policy Management Editor (GPMC). But sometimes you may face the issue of missing some of the Group Policy areas. For example, recently one of my friend reached me with this problem. On his GPMC window, ‘Security Settings’ were missing from the GP Editor snap-in. According to him, this issue occurred only after installing AD DS role on his Server 2019. To my surprise, when I researched on this, I found that it is a known issue for Microsoft. The company has already provided a working solution via this documentation.

So if you are also facing this problem, here’s how you can easily resolve it.

Fix: Missing Group Policy areas from Group Policy Editor

According to Microsoft, there are some default Group Policy snap-in DLLs which register each area of policy functionality. But this is a known problem that occasionally these DLLs can unregister and remove themselves. As a result of this, some of the areas of Group Policy can be missing in GP Editor UI.

So to resolve this, you had to re-register default Group Policy snap-in DLLs. Follow these steps:

1. Right click Start Button or press  + X keys and select Command Prompt (Admin) to open Command Prompt as administrator.

2. In the Command Prompt window, type command corresponding to UI element missing in GP Editor and press Enter key.

Group Policy area missing	Command to re-register DLL
Administrative Templates and Scripts	regsvr32 gptext.dll
Folder Redirection	regsvr32 fde.dll
Internet Explorer Maintenance	regsvr32 ieaksie.dll
IP Security	regsvr32 ipsecsnp.dll
Public Key and Software Restriction	regsvr32 certmgr.dll
Remote Installation Services	regsvr32 rigpsnap.dl
Security	regsvr32 wsecedit.dll
Software Installation	regsvr32 appmgr.dll

3. Once you’ve re-registered DLL for missing Group Policy area, you can exit Command Prompt and reboot the system.

After restart, you’ll find that missing Group Policy area is now restored back.

Hope this helps!

Related: Windows Server Stuck At ‘Applying Computer Settings’ Screen.