A BitLocker recovery key is a special key that you can create when you turn on Bitlocker Drive Encryption for the first time on each drive that you encrypt. You can use the recovery key to gain access to your computer if the
operating system drive (drive that Windows is installed on) is encrypted using BitLocker Drive Encryption and BitLocker detects a condition that prevents it from unlocking the drive when the computer is starting up. A recovery key can also be used to gain access to your files and folders on a
fixed data drive (internal hard drive) or
removable data drive (such as an external hard drive or USB flash drive) that is encrypted by BitLocker, if for some reason you forget the password or your computer cannot access the drive.
You can
back up the BitLocker recovery key for an encrypted drive by printing it, saving it to your Microsoft account, saving it to a USB flash drive, and/or saving it to a file where you like. It is recommended to store the recovery key separate from your computer, and make additional copies to be safe and have available if ever needed to recover the encrypted drive with.
When you back up your recovery key to your Microsoft account, the recovery key gets saved online to your OneDrive for you to get if ever locked out of the encrypted drive.
This tutorial will show you how to delete a backed up
BitLocker recovery key on your
OneDrive after it was saved to your Microsoft account in
Windows 10.