Why WSL updates itself regardless of any running processes? #12675
Replies: 11 comments 7 replies
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I am also interested to find this out. It is very frustraining |
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For me, if it updates via |
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@astroboylrx: It's indeed the Windows Store that performs WSL updates (no one else does unless The group policy you mentioned only applies to Windows updates (and not store updates). But the store settings should disable auto updates. If not, I'd suspect that either there's something else on the machine that manually calls wsl --update, or potentially another user that might have auto updates turned on. |
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@OneBlue I'm the only user. It happened on all three of my windows machines, two laptops and one desktop. I'm usually a beta insider, but I've tried non-insider versions and found out this doesn't matter--it happened even with a fresh install of windows. Is there any way to check what actually triggered the update and what process called |
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@astroboylrx: Not after the update has happened unfortunately. Could you share a screenshot of the store auto update settings ? That's the most likely culprit here |
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@OneBlue Sorry for the late response. Here is a screenshot: |
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Interesting. If the store isn't the culprit, I'd look at other installed programs, and potentially intune policies that your administrator might have set. Unfortunately this isn't something that can be solved from the Windows side. |
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Just a wild guess, could this be Docker Desktop that forces the updates on WSL? |
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Chime in to say the same. I'm in the middle of running a docker build and all my wsl instances just exit without any prior notice. Running the command Please fix this asap. You are not suppose to kill user instance like this. You just wasted few hours of my time doing a rebuild. |
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Same here (this has been the case for a few versions now). WSL should not update automatically - even if auto-updates are enabled in the Microsoft Store. It's too critical; people who rely on WSL can't afford it to just stop unannounced. WSL is not a "regular" app :) |
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I'm experiencing this on my production workstation as well, and I've been digging into what is happening. It looks like the WSL updater is attempting to restart the service automatically, and failing. I see the following errors in my Application Event Logs: I haven't deeply studied the update process, but it looks like there's a loss of trust along the workflow, to the point that the Windows security system is refusing to let the WSL process re-launch itself. But really the bigger question is, why is this happening automatically with no warning? |
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I understand that the update is not triggered by WSL itself, but there should be some effort done to mitigate the situation (at least get stats of callers of wsl --update by telemetry maybe?), and if a common culprit is the MS Store or any other Windows component the issue should be forwarded to them (and for what it is worth also forwarded to any major third party project if the problem comes from it) |
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Same issue. Autoupdate has already been disabled in Windows Store, but WSL keeps getting updated automatically. Now I'm unclicking "Receive updates for other Microsoft products" in settings to see what happens. |
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No use. "System components" still get automatically updated. |
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Correct. Windows Update and Windows Store updates are disabled, and it is still happening (another restart today) -- it's been plaguing me for a year. @OneBlue I manage my own Group Policies as admin, any clues on what is causing this? I'll need to dig through the registry to find a more aggressive solution. |
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We now have to disable the whole Windows update service so that WSL updates don't break the development environment in the middle of the day. Whoever thought it was a good idea to centralize updates clearly didn't have developers in mind. |
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3 years no fix for this issue it is terrible! |
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Damn!! WSL random updates in background killing my >10 terminals and >20 docker services while I'm working!! |
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Whenever an update is released, Windows Store terminates my WSL and updates it for me, regardless of any running processes. I'm using WSL2 for work for a long time. I don't think the update was this aggressive previously, at least before 2024.
Is there something I can do to prevent this? Thanks in advance.
Maybe it is not Windows Store who actually did the update? Maybe the Store just shows an update was done? What module performs the update?
I already turned off auto app updates in the Store settings and even enabled "Turn off Automatic Downloads and Install of updates" in the group policy.
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