Admins using Windows Server Update Services up in arms as Microsoft deprecates feature

Windows Server 2025 remains in preview, but Microsoft has been busy letting users know what is set for removal and what will be deprecated in the release. WSUS fits into the latter category – still there for now, but no longer under active development.

This is a big deal for many administrators who rely on the feature to deploy and manage the distribution of updates and features in an enterprise environment. It'll even work on a network disconnected from the internet – download the patches to a connected computer, stick them on some removable media, import the patches to a WSUS server on the disconnected network, and away you go.

A tame administrator told El Reg: "We are migrating to Intune. It's a lot more complicated than WSUS, and it takes a lot longer to get set up."

Microsoft's advice is, unsurprisingly, to migrate to cloud tools. As well as the aforementioned Intune, there is also Windows Autopatch for client update management or Azure Update Manager for server update management. And there are plenty of third-party tools out there too, such as Ansible.

Leave a Comment