Specify the types of events Windows Installer records in its transaction log

Policy ID: MSILogging
Scope: Computer Configuration
Supported on: At least Windows 2000
Source: Administrative Templates (.admx) for Windows 11 2026 Update (26H2) (version 1.0)
Category: Windows Components › Windows Installer

Description

Specifies the types of events that Windows Installer records in its transaction log for each installation. The log, Msi.log, appears in the Temp directory of the system volume.

When you enable this policy setting, you can specify the types of events you want Windows Installer to record. To indicate that an event type is recorded, type the letter representing the event type. You can type the letters in any order and list as many or as few event types as you want.

To disable logging, delete all of the letters from the box.

If you disable or do not configure this policy setting, Windows Installer logs the default event types, represented by the letters "iweap."

Options

Logging
To activate logging, enter one or more of the modes below.
"iwearucmpvox" will log everything but adds time to the install.
i - Status messages
w - Non-fatal warnings
e - All error messages
a - Start up of actions
r - Action-specific records
u - User requests
c - Initial UI parameters
m - Out-of-memory
p - Terminal properties
v - Verbose output
o - Out of disk space messages
x - Extra debugging information

Registry

ComputerHKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE

HKLM\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Installer View registry values

LoggingREG_SZ

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