Hyper-V

Hyper-V (codenamed Viridian) is a native hypervisor for AMD64 and ARM64 platforms developed by Microsoft, which is available as an optional Microsoft Windows component. It allows creating virtual machines on a Windows host and managing them over RDP. The Hyper-V virtualization stack is also used to implement other Windows features such as Windows Subsystem for Linux or Windows Defender's Virtualization-Based Security and Application Guard features.
It was introduced with the x64 Windows Server 2008 as the successor to Microsoft Virtual Server, the server counterpart of the Virtual PC application acquired from Connectix. Since Windows 8, it is also included with Pro and higher client editions. Additionally, Microsoft used to offer Hyper-V Server up through 2019, a Windows Server Core edition which only supports the Hyper-V server role and was free of charge.
Unlike other virtualization software available for Windows, Hyper-V uses a type-1 (native) hypervisor, which is initialized at startup and lets the host operating system itself run under the hypervisor in a special so-called root partition. Other solutions, such as VirtualBox or VMware Workstation, typically use type-2 hypervisors that run on top of a conventional operating system.
Display output from virtual machines is provided via the Remote Desktop Protocol; the hypervisor includes an "enhanced session mode" that offers additional VM display capabilities through a dedicated driver built into the operating system and by having the RDP protocol interface with the Windows session manager.
== Windows Hypervisor Platform ==
Windows Hypervisor Platform is a user mode API that is used to manage Hyper-V hypervisor partitions introduced with Windows 10 April 2018 Update. It is primarily used by third-party virtualization software such as VirtualBox or VMware Workstation,Zongmin. VMware Workstation 15.5 Now Supports Host Hyper-V Mode, VMware Workstation Zealot. 28 May 2020. Oracle. VirtualBox version 6.0 changelog, Oracle VM VirtualBox documentation. 18 December 2020. as they cannot directly use hardware virtualization extensions when Hyper-V is enabled. It is also supported by QEMU and Android Emulator as an accelerator engine.
It is a low-level interface that only exposes the virtual CPU, memory and optionally the interrupt controller, leaving the implementation of necessary hardware components and system software up to the consumer. This is in contrast with Host Compute System, a high-level API used by WSL2 and Microsoft Emulator, which effectively provides fully-implemented headless Hyper-V virtual machines.
== Virtual Machine Platform ==
Virtual Machine Platform is an optional Windows feature, which enables selected parts of the Hyper-V infrastructure. It is a dependency of several Windows features and other Microsoft products, including:
* Windows Subsystem for Linux 2
* Windows Subsystem for Android
* Microsoft Emulator
== Microsoft Emulator ==
A watered-down version of the hypervisor (dubbed the X Device Emulator (XDE), later renamed to Microsoft Emulator) that simulates a physical device was also produced - originally a fork of Virtual PC used to emulate Windows CE-based operating systems like Windows Phone 7, and later ported to support Windows Phone 8.x and Windows 10 Mobile, it has since been expanded to a multitude of different purposes such as replicating the functionality of the HoloLens head-mounted display in virtual form and self-hosting Windows 10X builds.
== Supported guest operating systems ==
This is a definitive list of officially supported operating systems that can run under Hyper-V, as of Windows Server 2025.https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/virtualization/hyper-v/supported-windows-guest-operating-systems-for-hyper-v-on-windowshttps://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/virtualization/hyper-v/supported-linux-and-freebsd-virtual-machines-for-hyper-v-on-windows
*Windows 7 with Service Pack 1 and above
*Windows Server 2008 with Service Pack 2 and above
*Most Linux distributions
=== Deprecated operating systems ===
The following operating systems are supported on older versions of Hyper-V on older host Windows systems, but aren't supported in the latest Windows 11 version of Hyper-V.https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/windows/it-pro/windows-server-2008-R2-and-2008/cc794868(v=ws.10)https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/windows/it-pro/windows-server-2012-R2-and-2012/dn792028(v=ws.11)
*Windows 2000 Server with Service Pack 4 (support removed on Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012)
*Windows XP with Service Pack 2 or Windows XP Professional x64 Edition with Service Pack 2 (support removed on Windows 10 and Windows Server 2016)
*Windows Server 2003 with Service Pack 2 (support removed on Windows 10 and Windows Server 2016)
*Windows Vista with Service Pack 2 (support removed on Windows 11)
*Windows Small Business Server 2011 (support removed on Windows 11)
*Windows Home Server 2011 (support removed on Windows 11)
*Windows MultiPoint Server 2011 (support removed on Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012)
== Gallery ==
=== Hyper-V ===
File:Hyper-V Manager.png|Hyper-V Manager
File:Quick Create.png|Quick Create
File:New.png|New Virtual Machine Wizard
File:Import Virtual Machine.png|Import Virtual Machine
File:Hyper-V Settings.png|Hyper-V Settings
File:Virtual Switch Manager.png|Virtual Switch Manager
File:Virtual SAN Manager.png|Virtual SAN Manager
File:Edit Disk.png|Edit Virtual Hard Disk Wizard
File:Hyper-V About.png|About Hyper-V Manager
File:9471 5.png|Hyper-V booting Windows 8.1 build 9471
File:Hyper-V.png|Hyper-V running Windows 10 build 10565
=== XDE/Microsoft Emulator ===
Windows10Mobile-10.0.10030.0-XDE-StartScreen.png|XDE running Windows 10 Mobile build 10030
Windows10X-10.0.19578.1000-EmulatorUI.png|Microsoft Emulator running Windows 10X build 19578
Windows10X-10.0.19578.1000-EmulatorAddTools-SantOrientation.png|Ditto, device orientation settings
== References ==
Category:Hypervisors