Microsoft Makes Linux Container Support Generally Available in WSL

Microsoft has made WSL Containers generally available, extending Windows Subsystem for Linux beyond running Linux distributions. Users can install the feature with wsl --update. It adds the wslc.exe command-line tool, with container.exe available as an alias for familiar container commands.

A WSL Containers API also lets Windows apps launch and interact with Linux containers programmatically. Microsoft said this could support scenarios such as running local AI workloads or using cloud-based containerized applications locally.

The general availability release adds container restart, file copy, health check, network connect and disconnect, real-time event, and mount capabilities, as well as configurable storage locations. WSL Containers also integrates with Microsoft Defender for Endpoint, allowing security teams to view container process, file, and network activity and relate it to the Windows host. Microsoft Intune can disable WSL Containers or limit developers to images from approved registries.

VS Code Dev Containers can use wslc as their default driver. Aspire and the VS Code Containers extension also support WSL Containers. Microsoft says it is working on Docker Compose-style support, aiming to make wsl compose up work with existing compose.yaml files unchanged.

Microsoft is also working on WSL networking and cross-OS file performance. The company says WSL Containers can already deliver up to 2x faster performance when accessing Windows files from Linux environments.