Where is sn.exe on Windows?

Table of contents

Summary

The Strong Name tool (Sn.exe) helps sign assemblies with strong names. Sn.exe provides options for key management, signature generation, and signature verification. It does not come preinstalled and you need to install specific package with visual studio installer to get it. At the time of this writing ”.NET Framework 4.8.1 SDK” does the trick.

Overview

sn.exe helps sign assemblies with strong names.

A typical usecase of using sn.exe is to generate pub-private key-pair. This key-pair can then be used to sign assemblies.

Warning: strong name provides identity and not security.

You’ll have to install ”.NET Framework 4.8.1 SDK” or something similar to get sn.exe. The exact location of sn.exe can be determined on command line as follows:

c:
cd c:\
dir /s sn.exe

C:\>dir /s sn.exe
 Volume in drive C has no label.
 Volume Serial Number is ????-????

 Directory of C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v10.0A\bin\NETFX 4.8.1 Tools

24-06-2022  20:22           287,168 sn.exe
               1 File(s)        287,168 bytes

 Directory of C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v10.0A\bin\NETFX 4.8.1 Tools\x64

24-06-2022  19:56           315,360 sn.exe
               1 File(s)        315,360 bytes