Comparison of Windows Server editions (2024)

Use this article to compare the Standard, Datacenter, and Datacenter: Azure Edition of Windows Server to see which is most appropriate for you.

Important

Windows Server 2025 is in PREVIEW. This information relates to a prerelease product that may be substantially modified before it's released. Microsoft makes no warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to the information provided here.

Feature	Sub-feature	Standard edition	Datacenter edition	Datacenter: Azure Edition
.NET Framework 3.5 Features
.NET Framework 4.8 Features
Activation
	Automatic Virtual Machine Activation	¹		²
	Key Management Service (KMS)			³
Active Directory Certificate Services
	Certificate Enrollment Policy Web Service
	Certificate Enrollment Web Service
	Certification Authority
	Certification Authority Web Enrollment
	Network Device Enrollment Service
	Online Responder
Active Directory Domain Services
Active Directory Federation Services
Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
Active Directory Rights Management Services
Azure Extended Networking
Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS)
BitLocker Drive Encryption
BitLocker Network Unlock		⁴	⁴	⁴
BranchCache
Client for NFS
Data Center Bridging
Device Health Attestation
DHCP Server
Direct Play		³	⁴	⁴
DLNA codecs and web media streaming		³	⁴	⁴
DNS Server
Enhanced Storage
Failover Clustering
Fax Server
File and Storage Services
	BranchCache for Network Files
	Data Deduplication
	DFS Namespaces
	DFS Replication
	File Server
	File Server Resource Manager
	File Server VSS Agent Service
	iSCSI Target Server
	iSCSI Target Storage Provider (VDS and VSS hardware providers)
	Server for NFS
	SMB 1.0/CIFS File Sharing Support
	SMB Bandwidth Limit
	SMB over QUIC
	Work Folders
	Storage Migration Service
	Storage Migration Service Proxy
	Storage Spaces
	Storage Spaces Direct
	Storage Replica
Group Policy Management
Host Guardian Hyper-V Support
Host Guardian Service
Hotpatching		⁵	⁵
I/O Quality of Service
IIS Hostable Web Core
IP Address Management (IPAM) Server
Management OData IIS Extension
Media Foundation
Message Queuing
	Message Queuing DCOM Proxy
	Message Queuing Services
Microsoft Defender Antivirus
Multipath I/O
MultiPoint Connector
Network ATC
Network Controller
Network Load Balancing
Network Policy and Access Services		⁴	⁴	⁴
Network Virtualization
Print and Document Services
	Internet Printing	⁴	⁴	⁴
	Line Printer Daemon (LPD) Service	⁴	⁴	⁴
	Print Server	⁴	⁴	⁴
Quality Windows Audio Video Experience
RAS Connection Manager Administration Kit (CMAK)
Remote Access
	DirectAccess and VPN (RAS)
	Routing
	Web Application Proxy
Remote Assistance		⁴	⁴	⁴
Remote Desktop Services		⁴	⁴	⁴
Remote Differential Compression
Remote Server Administration Tools
RPC over HTTP Proxy
Setup and Boot Event Collection
Simple TCP/IP Services		⁴	⁴	⁴
SNMP Service
Software Load Balancer
System Data Archiver
System Insights
Telnet Client
TFTP Client		⁴	⁴	⁴
Virtualization
	Containers
	Hyper-V
	GPU partitioning	⁶		⁶
	VM Shielding Tools for Fabric Management
Volume Activation Services
Web Server (IIS)
	FTP Server
	Web Server
WebDAV Redirector
Windows Biometric Framework		⁴	⁴	⁴
Windows Deployment Services
Windows Identity Foundation 3.5		⁴	⁴	⁴
Windows Internal Database
Windows PowerShell
	Windows PowerShell 2.0 Engine
	Windows PowerShell 5.1
	Windows PowerShell Desired State Configuration Service
	Windows PowerShell Web Access
Windows Process Activation Service
Windows Search Service		⁴	⁴	⁴
Windows Server Backup
Windows Server Migration Tools
Windows Server Update Services
Windows Standards-Based Storage Management
Windows Subsystem for Linux
Windows TIFF IFilter		⁴	⁴	⁴
WinRM IIS Extension
WINS Server
Wireless LAN Service
WoW64 Support
XPS Viewer		⁴	⁴	⁴

As a guest if hosted on a virtualization host activated with Datacenter edition
See Also
Windows Server 2024 Features | Requirements That you Need to Know
Datacenter: Azure Edition can be used as a nested host or guest
Activated by Azure and can't be configured as a KMS host
When installed as Server with Desktop Experience
Available as an Azure Arc-enabled service. To learn more about Azure Arc pricing, see the Azure Pricing Calculator
When used as a guest with the vGPU guest driver installed