Hide progress of Invoke-WebRequest

How can I hide the progress display of `Invoke-WebRequest`? I do a lot of successive requests and have my own `Write-Progress` display that I use, so I don't need the built-in one popping up underneath it every time.

I use the mshtml results (the IE COM object) that are created from the result of `Invoke-WebRequest` automatically, so I can't switch to a `WebClient` or something like that, unless someone provides instructions on how to get an mshtml object from a WebClient request.

Use the $progressPreference variable. It should have a value of 'Continue' by default unless you've edited it elsewhere, which tells Powershell to display the progress bar. Since you mentioned that you have your own custom progress displays, I would reset it immediately after the cmdlet is executed. For example:

$ProgressPreference = 'SilentlyContinue' # Subsequent calls do not display UI.
Invoke-WebRequest ...
$ProgressPreference = 'Continue' # Subsequent calls do display UI.
Write-Progress ...

More info on preference variables at [about_preference_variables][1]. Here's the entry for $ProgressPreference:

$ProgressPreference
-------------------
Determines how Windows PowerShell responds to progress updates
generated by a script, cmdlet or provider, such as the progress bars
generated by the Write-Progress cmdlet. The Write-Progress cmdlet
creates progress bars that depict the status of a command.

Valid values:
Stop: Does not display the progress bar. Instead,
it displays an error message and stops executing.

Inquire: Does not display the progress bar. Prompts
for permission to continue. If you reply
with Y or A, it displays the progress bar.

Continue: Displays the progress bar and continues with
(Default) execution.

SilentlyContinue: Executes the command, but does not display
the progress bar.


[1]:

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Here is a **reusable function** to temporarily hide the progress of any *script block* and automatically restore the progress preference when the script block ends, **even if an exception** (script-terminating error) is thrown by the script block.

~~~lang-sh
# Create an in-memory module so $ScriptBlock doesn't run in new scope
$null = New-Module {
function Invoke-WithoutProgress {
[CmdletBinding()]
param (
[Parameter(Mandatory)] [scriptblock] $ScriptBlock
)

# Save current progress preference and hide the progress
$prevProgressPreference = $global:ProgressPreference
$global:ProgressPreference = 'SilentlyContinue'

try {
# Run the script block in the scope of the caller of this module function
. $ScriptBlock
}
finally {
# Restore the original behavior
$global:ProgressPreference = $prevProgressPreference
}
}
}
~~~

**Usage example:**
~~~lang-sh
Invoke-WithoutProgress {
# Here $ProgressPreference is set to 'SilentlyContinue'
Invoke-WebRequest ...
}

# Now $ProgressPreference is restored
Write-Progress ...
~~~

**Notes:**

- The `New-Module` call is there so the script block passed to `Invoke-WithoutProgress` **doesn't run in a new scope** (allowing it to directly modify surrounding variables, similar to `ForEach-Object`'s script block). See [this answer][1] for more information.


[1]:

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