Microsoft is killing this 25-year-old Windows tool. Your scripts might break

The useful part

With the latest Windows 11 preview update (KB5120998), Microsoft is finally bidding farewell to a tool that has been part of the operating system since Windows XP: the Windows Management Instrumentation Command-line (WMIC). The announcement comes via Microsoft's official release notes for KB512098, meant for Release Preview Builds 26100.9267 and 26200.9267. The removal is set to be incorporated into the regular Windows versions when the update gets its wider release.

How it works

• Administrators and power users could, for example, use it to retrieve hardware data, BIOS information, or run processes via commands.
• Since then, the company has been phasing the tool out, with new Windows 11 installations already excluding WMIC.
• With this preview update, even existing Windows PCs will no longer have WMIC at all.
• WMIC is a command-line utility that can be used to retrieve system information and automate administrative tasks.

Example or evidence

• Microsoft already classified WMIC as deprecated back in 2024.
• With this update, Microsoft is removing the wmic.exe executable file.