Install Hermes Agent on Windows in 10 Minutes (Step-by-Step with WSL2)

Hermes Agent is built for macOS and Linux, but Windows users do not have to sit this one out. Using WSL2 (Windows Subsystem for Linux), you can get an AI agent live on a Windows 10 or Windows 11 machine in under ten minutes. Here is the exact path I walked through on a fresh PowerShell window, with the small gotchas that trip people up flagged along the way.

I am not an AI expert. I am building in public and sharing what actually works.

What you need before you start

• A Windows 10 or Windows 11 PC (the steps are identical on both)
• PowerShell (already on your machine, you just have to open it the right way)
• A model account you can authenticate against. In this walkthrough I used OpenAI Codex with GPT 5.5
• About 10 minutes

That is it. No special hardware, no extra IDE, no manual Linux setup.

Step 1: Open PowerShell as Administrator

This is the gate that trips most beginners. A normal PowerShell window will not be allowed to install WSL.

• Press Start and search "PowerShell"
• Right click the result
• Select Run as administrator

Step 2: Install WSL2

In the elevated PowerShell window, run: