What is PowerShell? PS is a cross-platform task automation solution made up of a command-line shell, a scripting language, and a configuration management framework. PowerShell runs on Windows, Linux, and macOS. Unlike most shells that only accept and return text, PowerShell accepts and returns .NET objects. As a scripting language, PowerShell is commonly used for automating the management of systems. PowerShell is built on the .NET Common Language Runtime (CLR). All inputs and outputs are .NET objects.