Microsoft Confirms WMIC Tool Removal in Windows 11 26H2, Unavailable After August 2026

Microsoft has confirmed that the Windows Management Instrumentation Command-line (WMIC) tool will be completely removed in the Windows 11 26H2 feature update, ending all support for the utility. WMIC was introduced alongside Windows XP in 2001 and has long been used by IT administrators to interact with Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) for managing hardware and software components on personal computers. The tool was commonly used for tasks such as querying motherboard models or extracting system product keys.

The deprecation of WMIC began with Windows Server in 2016, extended to Windows 10 in 2021, and it was disabled by default in Windows 11. Previously, on fresh installations of Windows 10 and Windows 11, the tool could still be manually added as a feature on demand, but Microsoft has now made clear that it will not appear in the next generation of Windows. Recently, Microsoft pushed Release Preview builds of Windows 11 24H2 and 25H2 to Insider users, with build numbers 26100.9267 and 26200.9267 respectively, included in update KB5120998.

The release notes state that after August 2026, WMIC will no longer be included in Windows 11. That version will eventually be released to the public as Windows 11 26H2, confirming that WMIC will neither be bundled by default nor installable as a feature on demand.

With the gradual phasing out of WMIC, IT administrators and users who rely on scripts using the tool have begun migrating to more advanced alternatives.