How to Determine Windows Version

Updated: 2021-12-07 ∙ 5 mins read ∙ Tags: Devops, Tips, Windows, Registry
How to Determine Windows Version

So how does one determine the version of Windows running across an enterprise environment?

Sounds simple, right?

Microsoft surfaces Windows Version numbers in various locations:

  • There are Registry values, which are desperately missing documentation.
  • There are numerous PowerShell Cmdlets, Windows API calls, etc.
  • There are also end-user options such as the winver command, which pops up a window that tells the user what their Windows version is.
  • And many more…

Helping you make sense of this all is where this post comes in.

There are many tools available to help you determine which version of Windows your clients are running such as SCCM, PDQ. This post will focus on built-in methods for determining Windows version.

Registry

The following Registry values can be used to determine the version of Windows a system is running:

Key Value Data Example Explanation
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion ReleaseId 2009 Version number integer (as a string). Added in version 1803, Deprecated with 21H1
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion DisplayVersion 20H2 Version codename mixed string. Added in version 1803.
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion CurrentBuild 19042 Version build number, used by winver.exe.

The values listed in the table above are not officially documented by Microsoft (see below)

Word of Warning

Microsoft has not communicated changes to these Registry values, documented their official support, or guaranteed against breaking changes in the future. This has lead to a frustrating experience using the Registry keys above, given how inconsistent Microsoft’s updates to these keys have historically been. Examples:

  • ReleaseID was deprecated in version 21H1. The ReleaseID for 21H1 remains 2009.
  • Server 2012R2 doesn’t have ReleaseID or DisplayVersion (they weren’t added to Windows yet)
  • Server 2016 has ReleaseID (1607) but no DisplayVersion
  • Server 2019 has ReleaseID (1809) no DisplayVersion

PowerShell

Below are some examples of how you can use PowerShell to determine the version of Windows your systems are running:

# Using the System.Environment Class
[System.Environment]::OSVersion

# Using the Win32_OperatingSystem CIM Class
Get-CimInstance Win32_OperatingSystem

# Using the systeminfo executable
systeminfo.exe /fo csv | ConvertFrom-Csv

# Using the Get-ComputerInfo Cmdlet
# NOTE: OsHardwareAbstractionLayer was deprecated in version 21H1
Get-ComputerInfo | Select WindowsProductName, WindowsVersion, OsHardwareAbstractionLayer

Windows API Call

The only supported (documented) systematic way of determining a Windows version is through a Windows API call to the AnalyticsInfo class. This can be done via PowerShell as shown below:

Credit: @pronichkin

End-User Options

Microsoft documentation lists a few commands end-users can use to determine which version of Windows they are running. For example, the winver command, or the Windows Settings menu can be used to determine Windows Version. This is meant to be more end-user facing for verification, rather than for use to determine system version at scale. Examples below:

winver winversettings

Why This Matters

Once you’ve determined the version of Windows your systems are running, you can use this information to take deterministic actions such as installing Windows Updates, applying patches, etc. For example:

You can query the DisplayVersion registry value (above) to determine which version of Windows your systems are running. Then, you could set the Registry values listed below that tell Windows which version the system should be running. With three registry keys, you’ve fully controlled which version of Windows your systems will attempt to upgrade to!

Key Value Data Example Explanation
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsUpdate TargetReleaseVersion 1 Setting this to one enables Feature Upgrades to the TargetReleaseVersionInfo version
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsUpdate TargetReleaseVersionInfo 20H2 The target version of the system
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsUpdate ProductVersion Windows 10 New in Windows 11 - one of “Windows 10” or “Windows 11”

These registry values can either be set directly, or via Group Policy

Where to go from here

While it’s not necessary to manage which versions of Windows are running on your fleet, it’s likely valuable information to your Enterprise which versions of Windows are currently running on your fleet. If just for the fact that Windows regularly ends support for versions of Windows.

Further, I’ll note that the examples above are not meant to be an exhaustive list of ways to determine Windows version, but rather a reference for myself and other folks managing a Windows environment. These methods have proven useful to me when troubleshooting issues, setting policy, etc. Hopefully you’ll find them useful as well.

Finally, managing Windows versions has always been a moving target. So I look forward to making another post about how to manage Windows versions in the future, once Microsoft has deprecated the existing methods posted above.

Feel free to reach out if you run into any issues, and see related links (below) for further reading. Hopefully, this post saved you some Googling around trying to find all this information 🔎


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