A few weeks ago, the folks at NeoWin (via Bleeping Computer) shared about the discovery of the ability to push app installs  from the Microsoft Store on the web.

Several other sites picked up the story line and attempted to use the same process but had a mixture of results – with most failing to work properly.

Over the last few weeks, the Microsoft Store app for Windows 10 has received several updates. While I can not confirm 100% that one of those updates triggers this ability, I now have one device that is giving me the option to target installs from the web listing for Microsoft Store apps.

Let’s take a look at what this process looks like.

The first thing you notice is that the web based listing for apps are different compared to the listing we are used to seeing online in the Microsoft Store:

Microsoft Store Old Style Web Listing
Current Web Based Microsoft Store Listing

Microsoft Store Web Installs
New Microsoft Store Web Listing

So you can see the normal listing in the top image and then what listings look like on the one system I have which is allowing me to target devices for remote app installations. Note: This is on a production release of Windows 10 Version 1803.

So if you are seeing that second style of listing you might just have the remote ability on your system.

Select the “…” option to begin the install process.

Microsoft Store Web Listing

The resulting drop down will show an option to Install on my devices so select that to continue.

Microsoft Store Targeted Installs

In the next dialog box you will see a list of all of your devices that are using the same Microsoft Account. Just browse through this list and select which devices you want to install this particular app on.

Microsoft Store Targeted Installs

Once you have selected all of your target devices, select the Install now button.

Microsoft Store Web Installs

You will get a confirmation that the selected installs will now be attempted.

At this point I headed around to my other machines and logged in to see about the install of the app I sent via the web based listing.

Within just a few minutes of logging into those devices, the Microsoft Store started installing the app on each device so I was very pleased with the results. This was a great experience and it will be nice to see this made available for all Windows 10 users.

Microsoft Store
App Install from Targeted Device in Progress

If we never return to the sync app install that was such a great part of Windows 8/8.1, then this web based app install targeting will work just fine.

Do any of you have this ability yet?

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