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Microsoft Operating Systems Windows Linux

Microsoft Makes Linux Containers Native On Windows 11 (nerds.xyz) 57

Posted by BeauHD from the natively-supported dept.
BrianFagioli shares a report from NERDS.xyz: Microsoft has made WSL Containers generally available, giving Windows 11 developers a built-in way to build, run, and deploy Linux containers through Windows Subsystem for Linux. The release includes wslc.exe for managing containers, GPU support, networking improvements, health checks, storage mounts, and integration with Microsoft Defender for Endpoint and Intune. Microsoft also claims up to twice the performance when Linux environments access files stored on Windows.

Docker Desktop, Podman Desktop, and Rancher Desktop are not going anywhere, but developers who only need basic container functionality now have another option built around WSL. One notable feature is still missing: Compose support. Microsoft says adding it is now a priority.

Microsoft Makes Linux Containers Native On Windows 11 More | Reply

Microsoft Makes Linux Containers Native On Windows 11

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  • Oh How the Mighty Have Fallen (Score:5, Informative)

    by hutkept ( 10503251 ) on Tuesday September 29, 2026 @06:06PM (#66355714)
    It took Microsoft 25 years to go from "[Linux] is a cancer that attaches itself in an intellectual property sense to everything it touches" to running it natively in Windows.

    • Re: Oh How the Mighty Have Fallen (Score:5, Insightful)

      by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <drink@hyperlogos.org> on Tuesday September 29, 2026 @06:21PM (#66355734) Homepage Journal

      And it only took Windows 11 to make lots of people not want to do that any more, and only run Windows in a VM... Like any spyware.

      • Re: Oh How the Mighty Have Fallen (Score:5, Informative)

        by tannhaus ( 152710 ) on Tuesday September 29, 2026 @07:03PM (#66355816) Homepage Journal

        That's what a lot of the linux fanbase seems to think, but if you look at the numbers, Windows 11 has been a success for the company. It reached 1 billion users quicker than Windows 10 did. People hate change, but they do eventually come around. It even dominates among gamers according to the Steam Hardware Survey. Anecdotal evidence of what some guy may have told you when you were talking about linux or what some people in a forum said doesn't translate to real world numbers.

        • No one asserted that it didn't still dominate gaming, have fun with your straw man

          • But that is mostly caused by NVidia's lackluster (yes, I know they are improving somewhat, but still) driver support in Linux. I have 10 Proxmox nodes deployed. 2 of them use NVidia GPUs. Not even good ones or modern GPUs, but GPUs you would expect the kernel to support for several years already.

            The nodes with NVidia GPUs barely manage an uptime of 3 days. The other nodes use either Intel or AMD GPUs. And those run solidly for months. I have spent time migrating Proxmox from v8.x to v9.x as instructed, but

            • But that is mostly caused by NVidia's lackluster (yes, I know they are improving somewhat, but still) driver support in Linux.

              I had to dick around with config files again with the recent driver "improvements" to make suspend work (I had to fiddle with persistenced) so yeah, I agree that Nvidia drivers for Linux do suck, but I don't think that's the primary thing keeping Windows going. I would lean on the following two words: Inertia, and Anticompetitive. Write your own story, it's pretty obvious by now.

              Not even good ones or modern GPUs, but GPUs you would expect the kernel to support for several years already.

              I don't want to poop on Nouveau, but it's just not useful. It's not their fault, as they are mostly pooped on by Nvidia. IME close

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by batkiwi ( 137781 )

                I don't want to poop on Nouveau, but it's just not useful. It's not their fault, as they are mostly pooped on by Nvidia. IME closed Nvidia drivers are better than closed AMD drivers, but the open AMD drivers are very good.

                If you're talking about Linux, there are no closed AMD drivers. So yeah, the Nvidia drivers are better than something that doesn't exist.

                • They did exist for years, sorry I didn't use the correct tense there. And they were always shit, like all AMD software. I have long liked their CPUs and now even like their GPUs but they really need to learn how to do the supporting parts someday.

            • This may surprise you, but the overwhelming majority of users know and care exactly nothing about linux driver support, if they know anything about linux at all. I guarantee you that Nvidia drivers have exactly nothing to do with why Windows is the more popular gaming platform.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by SirSlud ( 67381 )

              But that is mostly caused by NVidia's lackluster driver support in Linux.

              Uh, sure.

          • No one asserted that it didn't still dominate gaming, have fun with your straw man

            Gaming? Most Windows 11 isn't due to gaming. I know you can't fathom the idea that people don't care about the same things as you, but Windows 11 dominates literally every desktop use case.

        • Re: Oh How the Mighty Have Fallen (Score:5, Interesting)

          by Djdatlondon ( 1294024 ) on Tuesday September 29, 2026 @07:13PM (#66355836)
          By force mainly. Most average joes have no idea how to stop it from auto updating. I guarantee this is where these numbers are coming from.

          • There's also coercion, plenty of software insists you update once an OS goes out of primary support. It's one less OS version they have to support, even if there's no other reasons. That's been a major driver of OS and therefore sometimes hardware updates on both Windows PCs and Macs.

          • By force mainly. Most average joes have no idea how to stop it from auto updating. I guarantee this is where these numbers are coming from.

            I guarantee most of those numbers come from a different source: It turns out people just don't give a fuck. They use their computers and that's that. There's complete ambivalence to what OS they run, and they stick with whatever their computer booted up with on a given day. The assertion of force implies a resistance. Outside a small IT nerd community there is no resistance.

            • It's bizarre to see how unwilling Linux fans are to even consider the notion that people might like other operating systems. Or that they might be using Windows for reasons other than coercion or stupidity. It's almost like the idea that other people might not share their preferences never crosses their minds. And when they're faced with it, they get angry?

              It's like being mocked for going to Taco Bell instead of Burger King. Why?

              And I say this sitting between 3 Linux and 3 Windows machines. Who ca

            • By force mainly. Most average joes have no idea how to stop it from auto updating. I guarantee this is where these numbers are coming from.

              I guarantee most of those numbers come from a different source: It turns out people just don't give a fuck. They use their computers and that's that. There's complete ambivalence to what OS they run, and they stick with whatever their computer booted up with on a given day. The assertion of force implies a resistance. Outside a small IT nerd community there is no resistance.

              I can't argue with the premise- you are correct, most people will buy a computer, and never change. That's because they do email, a few documents, and browse the web.

              However, there is a non-zero chance that the people who don't give a fsck will not be all that happy when a Windows update scrags frags and bags their computer. And therein lies the issue. They might at that point, and even Microsoft admits W11 has a big problem.

              Yes, I and some others do a lot more with our computers than the bog standard

        • Re: Oh How the Mighty Have Fallen (Score:4, Informative)

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 29, 2026 @08:09PM (#66355922)

          You do realize that Microsoft essentially forced people into this? You can't get updates for Windows 10 anymore.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Monoman ( 8745 )

          IMO - The successful adoption rate of Windows 11 was primarily due to the end-of-support date for Windows 10 set by Microsoft. Organizations were pushed to adopt Windows 11 or face the financial consequences. MS charges more to support "end of life" systems, cyber-insurance companies will charge more, compliance requirements change when organizations have old systems, etc.

          As always, individual users made their own decisions but these days some choose to ditch the PC and user their phone.

          • That's like saying, "People are only using Resolute Racoon because Noble Numbat support ended".

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Monoman ( 8745 )

              Pretty much. Only it was mostly enterprises making the move to stay compliant.

              • Then why not talk about it in the same way? Why treat upgrades to one OS as something people were just forced to do and didn't really want, but for another it's just a matter of course?

        • That's what a lot of the linux fanbase seems to think, but if you look at the numbers, Windows 11 has been a success for the company. It reached 1 billion users quicker than Windows 10 did. People hate change, but they do eventually come around. It even dominates among gamers according to the Steam Hardware Survey. Anecdotal evidence of what some guy may have told you when you were talking about linux or what some people in a forum said doesn't translate to real world numbers.

          Yeah, there is a factor of people hating change.

          But unless you are living under a rock, all is not well in Windows land. Now for you, it might be perfection, never one p[roblem, a true zenith of computing perfection.

          That said, even Microsoft admits it is problematic (a polite word for a disaster) https://techcommunity.microsof... [microsoft.com]. https://www.windowslatest.com/... [windowslatest.com]

          I had my work laptop borked with that September update, killed the camera - no face login, wouldn't accept the PIN, wouldn't accept the

        • 80 to 90% of Windows 11 users are from work/business/corporations. Many of which dont have a choice. They are going to naturally pick the most widely used OS for compatibility. But home users who dont want forced cloud logins, onedrive, telemetry, Ai and constant scanning and updates.

      • Windows 11 has an install base in the billions. No "lots" of people are not running it in a VM. A tiny minority are.

    • It took Microsoft 25 years to go from "[Linux] is a cancer that attaches itself in an intellectual property sense to everything it touches" to running it natively in Windows.

      thanks to AI

    • Microsoft Azure (their cloud) relies heavily on Linux. Microsoft published Xenix, a Unix operating system, from 1980 to 1987.
    • Yep, and importantly Microsoft is admitting their attempt at an OS has failed, objectively. Windows has no place in the professional world apart from small edge cases, which are rare. What Microsoft should do is convert their OS into a user land you can run on top of Linux. Then you could natively leverage the existing tooling that is world-class, and rock solid, then play with the shards of broken glass, for people really into digital S&M.

  • You could already install docker on WSL and Windows still doesn't have native container support. I'm not sure what the use case for this is.

    • Re: What's new here? (Score:4, Funny)

      by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <drink@hyperlogos.org> on Tuesday September 29, 2026 @06:26PM (#66355748) Homepage Journal

      It's for people who want Microsoft to spy on their Linux

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Xenx ( 2211586 )
      It's outside my wheelhouse, so there are likely other valid reasons, but it would remove the need for a Docker license.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by zlives ( 2009072 )

        ummm, assuming if you are using a paid license it is for things like redundancy clustering and such. a win 11 doing a container... idk too lazy to have a linux deployment for dedicated use?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Anaerin ( 905998 )
      This is the "Native container support" that Windows was missing.

    • and Windows still doesn't have native container support

      It's almost like you didn't read TFS.

      You could already install docker on WSL

      And that's the problem being solved. Why spin up a whole WSL instance to run a container.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by DrXym ( 126579 )
      Docker on windows is usually done one of two ways - Docker for Desktop (a commercial product) which is basically using WSL2 as a backend and its own custom distro, or you install Ubuntu and install docker inside of it. Neither is particularly convenient if you just want to a container off the cuff for some reason and I assume Microsoft want to make it more easier, faster and more convenient for those use cases.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Himmy32 ( 650060 )

        Rancher Desktop and Podman Desktop are both FOSS, very convenient, support compose and Kubernetes, and are listed in the summary.

        Being native and pre-installed does make it a touch easier for the most basic use case, but it's not like it was hard before.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by DrXym ( 126579 )
          Who said it was "hard"? But it isn't fast and it is a pain in the ass if you just want to run a container having to do it through some desktop shim image (Rancher and Podman use backends images just like Docker) or an Ubuntu image. If wslc makes it easy to invoke straight from a prompt it will save time, memory and effort. I expect a compose function will show up in due course too. I would also not be surprised if some of these Desktop applications support wslc directly instead of through shim images.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by flink ( 18449 )

      Windows still doesn't have native container support. I'm not sure what the use case for this is.

      Linux containers share the kernal with the host. How exactly is a Linux container going to "natively" share the Windows kernal? You are always going to need to use a Linux VM as the Linux container host on windows. Having support built into the OS without having to explicitly install docker desktop or docker on WSL is a nice convenience, that's all. There are plenty of non-windows-native tools that can be delivered as a container now without worrying that the user has docker installed.

  • Linux OS Competitive Analysis: The Next Java VM?

  • The Year of the Linux Desktop (Score:4, Funny)

    by drnb ( 2434720 ) on Tuesday September 29, 2026 @07:09PM (#66355826)
    The "Year of the Linux Desktop" is finally arriving. Admittedly Linux on the Windows Desktop wasn't quite what we were expecting. :-)

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Himmy32 ( 650060 )

      We can continue to recycle this comment every time WSL gets a new feature. It's so creative, insightful, and has that slight anti-Microsoft slant that curmudgeon grey beards love.

      Here's to another whole decade of the same comment repeated!

  • Now you can run a secure and relatively private operating system inside an intrusive operating system that reports your every keystroke to Big Brother. Not only does this cancel the privacy benefits of the former, it allows the latter an even larger window into your private life than it had before while using more resources and, probably, delivering poorer performance. In other words, it's Microsoft in every possible way.

    • absolutely. the worst of both worlds. I was using WSL on a work laptop for a few months, even got as far as having linux apps launched from the start bar. But even then I still kept hitting the UX stupidity of windows and rage-wiped it for CachyOS. My boss is mad I don't get sophos updates any more but I've never been happier.

  • The containers still run through WSL, but having a built-in way to manage them could be handy. I'd like to see the "up to twice the performance" claim tested against actual bind-mount-heavy development workloads.

    No Compose support yet, though? That's the part of "basic container functionality" that turns one container into a useful local stack. Wake me when wslc.exe can run the project's existing setup without a rewrite.

  • I am so proud! A match made in sysadmin and tech-debt hell.

  • Yeah, I'll stick with native Linux and Microsoft can continue to go fuck themselves from here to eternity.

    • Yeah, I'll stick with native Linux and Microsoft can continue to go fuck themselves from here to eternity.

      I'll wager that just like all other things Microsoft, updates will render it inoperable.

  • Just to note, the WSL containerisation approach is horrible for anything I/O intensive. WSL 1 had ELF binaries supported by the kernel and ran natively, this is a far superior approach to WSL 2's containerisation when it comes to raw speed.

    I benchmarked this a few months ago and it was between 300%-600% slower on raw disk performance I/O.
    • Do you have IOMMU enabled? I hear that can cause a massive performance hit on raw disk performance for VMs.
  • We've gotten lots and lots of inquiries here in IT about why there's suddenly a penguin in their "My Computer Thingy" and our insurance company is demanding, via their scanning tool, that we remove the linux subsystem from all Windows computers because it allows for code execution, has tons of vulnerabilities, and we don't use it at all. I have no idea why this was rolled out widely.
    • I don't think that's enabled by default. It has to be installed. Maybe whoever manages your policies turned it on?

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