By Sourav Rudra
Publication Date: 2026-09-30 12:19:00
Announced via a two-part series of blogs, Microsoft has moved WSL containers (WSLC) out of public preview and into general availability. Let’s take a look at what it offers.
The new release comes with wslc.exe, a dedicated command-line tool for Linux container workflows on Windows. It ships with a built-in alias, container.exe, for those who prefer that syntax.
A Windows API also ships alongside it, giving native Windows applications a way to spin up and manage containers directly from code, as well as some new commands that include wslc events for tracking container activity, and --mount and --stop-timeout flags on create and run operations.
Networking is handled through a new model called Consommé, where container traffic leaves the virtual machine as Ethernet frames and is picked up by a Windows process running under the calling user’s account. That process handles DNS, routing, and port mapping, letting traffic pass through VPNs and firewalls…
