Create Bulk AD Users from CSV using Powershell Script

Creating Bulk AD Users in Active Directory is one of the important task for every Administrator either for testing or for set of actual new employees. Normally you can create new AD user using ADUC console. But it is time consuming job if you want create multiple ad users at the same time. To overcome this every administrator should rely on any of the script technology like VBScript and Powershell. In this article. I am going write and explain Powershell Script to Create Bulk AD Users from CSV.

Before proceed, please ensure that the Active Directory module for Windows Powershell is installed or not in your machine. It will be installed by default in Domain Controller. In client machines, you need to install it through Remote Server Administration Tools.
Use below command to check Active Directory module is installed or not:

1	Get-Module -Listavailable

If you are newbie to Powershell, don’t forget to set your Execution Policy to unrestricted or you might get an error when you try run the script. Use the below command to set your Execution Policy:

1	Set-ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted

Powershell Script to Create Bulk AD Users from CSV file

   1. Consider the CSV file NewUsers.csv which contains set of New AD Users to create with the attributes Name, samAccountName and ParentOU.

Note: The value of ParentOU should be enclosed with double quote ("). like "OU=TestOU,DC=TestDomain,DC=Local" since it has the special character comma (,). because in csv file the comma (,) is the key character to split column headers. (Ex file: Download NewUsers.csv).

   2. Copy the below Powershell script and paste in Notepad file.
   3. Change the NewUsers.csv file path with your own csv file path.
   4. Change the domain name TestDomain.local into your own domain name
   5. SaveAs the Notepad file with the extension .ps1 like Create-BulkADUsers-CSV.ps1

Click to download Powershell script as file Download Create-BulkADUsers-CSV.ps1

Import-Module ActiveDirectory Import-Csv "C:\Scripts\NewUsers.csv" | ForEach-Object {  $userPrincinpal = $_."samAccountName" + "@TestDomain.Local" New-ADUser -Name $_.Name `  -Path $_."ParentOU" `  -SamAccountName  $_."samAccountName" `  -UserPrincipalName  $userPrincinpal `  -AccountPassword (ConvertTo-SecureString "MyPassword123" -AsPlainText -Force) `  -ChangePasswordAtLogon $true  `  -Enabled $true Add-ADGroupMember "Domain Admins" $_."samAccountName"; }

   6. Now run the Create-BulkADUsers-CSV.ps1 file in Powershell to create Bulk Active Directory users from CSV file.

1	PS C:\Scripts> .\Create-BulkADUsers-CSV.ps1

Note: I have placed script file in the location C:\Scripts, if you placed in any other location, you can navigate to that path using CD path command (like cd "C:\Downloads").

   7. Now you can check the newly Created AD Users though ADUC console.

Add more AD Attributes to New User:

Here, we have Created Bulk AD Users from CSV with only three attributes Name, samAccountName and ParentOU by CSV input. If you want to give more attributes from CSV input, you can add that attributes into csv file and change the above Powershell script accordingly.

Example: if you want to add EmailAddress to new user, your csv file should be like below file.

Change the Powershell script like this:

Import-Module ActiveDirectory Import-Csv "C:\Scripts\NewUsers.csv" | ForEach-Object {  $userPrincinpal = $_."samAccountName" + "@TestDomain.Local" New-ADUser -Name $_.Name `  -Path $_."ParentOU" `  -SamAccountName  $_."samAccountName" `  -UserPrincipalName  $userPrincinpal `  -AccountPassword (ConvertTo-SecureString "MyPassword123" -AsPlainText -Force) `  -ChangePasswordAtLogon $true  `  -Enabled $true `  -EmailAddress $_."EmailAddress" Add-ADGroupMember "Domain Admins" $_."samAccountName"; }

Refer this technet article http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee617253.aspx to Create Bulk AD Users with more AD attributes.