Windows Admin Center (WAC) is the new way of managing Windows Server installations, both on-premises and in the cloud. Microsoft has not been secretive about the fact that WAC is the preferred tool for server management moving forward. Even though Server Manager has been dying a slow death and it is still in Windows Server 2025, Microsoft has been doubling down on improvements with WAC in 2025 to make it even better. They are improving performance, security, and making it easy to use. Let’s recap everything that is new and coming with Windows Admin Center this year and see which new features are worth paying attention to.
What Is Windows Admin Center?
As a quick review, in case you haven’t been brought up to speed on Windows Admin Center, what is it? It is Microsoft’s browser-based management tool that is designed for remotely administering Windows Server environments. It isn’t a replacement for tools like System Center. But, it complements these existing tools. Microsoft has designed it to be easy to install and easy to access with its browser-based architecture.
You download the installer, answer a couple of questions about certificates, and you are done in a couple more clicks.
Virtual Machine Management updates
One of the weaker points of the WAC solution since it first came out has been been virtual machine management. Admins still saw themselves opening Hyper-V manager or SCVMM to manage VMs. While it has featured some of the basic functionality that admins need, other features have been lacking. Microsoft has focused a lot of their engineering effort with recent releases of WAC on virtual machine management. There are three big improvements that stand out in 2025:
- VM import experience improvements
- Move VM and Move Storage
- VM inventory page
Let’s take a look at these one-by-one and see how they have improved.
New VM Import experience
The new and improved VM import experience is now available in public preview. It adds a user-friendly and step-by-step interface that helps to make the process much simpler. There are benefits to this new improved VM import experience. Here are a few to note:
- Storage and virtual adapter reconfiguration is supported on import
- There is now cluster VM import support
- Virtual processor saved state reset is supported
- A new Inline validation helps prevent configuration errors before the actual VM import runs
You can enable the preview by entering the experiment key msft.sme.hyperv.newImportFlow under Settings > Advanced in Windows Admin Center. Once you enable this, the new workflow appears in the Virtual Machines Tool.
The entire import process is fast and includes visual validation steps to avoid issues like naming collisions or misconfigured storage paths. It’s all about getting admins from start to finish with less risk of error.
Move VM and Move Storage
Microsoft has also introduced two new Move VM workflows:
- Move VM storage – Migrate all VM files to a single or multiple locations, with a redesigned experience. The new experience lets you configure paths and review details before initiating the move.
- Move VM within cluster – You can shift VMs between cluster nodes with support for live or quick migrations. Compatibility validation now alerts you if the target node isn’t supported for the move.
Both of the new workflows offer inline validation and guided steps to reduce the risk of failed operations. These features are currently in preview under the same experiment key as the import experience.
New VM inventory page
The VM inventory page has received a major overhaul in the latest version of Windows Admin Center. One of these upgrades includes major performance improvements. It now loads much faster, even when managing hosts with large numbers of virtual machines.
New features in the inventory page include:
- You can toggle the new view with enhanced responsiveness
- Now you can display the name of the OS and FQDN fields for each VM
- You can group and filter by VM state
- There is a new real-time search that works instantly as you start typing
- You also have the option to return to the classic view
This is especially useful for admins who deal with dozens or hundreds of VMs on a single host. And comparing this with the old Hyper-V Manager that many go back to due to its speed, Microsoft says load times are now comparable.
New security tooling
Security is front and center with Windows Admin Center in 2025. There are multiple new tools built around helping organizations with their compliance and security objectives.
Security baseline configuration with drift control
Windows Server security baselines include hundreds of recommended settings. WAC now makes it easy to apply and maintain those settings using a new guided interface that uses OSConfig.
Admins can:
- Monitor policy compliance via the new “Security Baseline” tab
- Select and apply multiple policies at once
- Use “Apply & Maintain” to enforce settings with drift control. This helps to make sure systems stay compliant over time
Silicon-Assisted Security (Secured-core Servers)
A new feature called “Silicon Assisted Security” tab provides centralized visibility and configuration of Secured-core and other silicon-backed protections. The experience is split into two groups:
- Informational Features – Requirements that may need external actions or configuration.
- Configurable Features – Security options you can enable directly from WAC.
This tool helps to make it easier to implement hardware security protections by consolidating the most relevant security features into a single view.
Windows LAPS integration
The Local Administrator Password Solution (LAPS) is now a part of Windows Admin Center.
Using this feature, admins can do the following:
- They can view and copy LAPS-managed passwords
- Password expiration times can be viewed and updated
- Admins can reset passwords across multiple machines at the same time
This helps to ease the burden of managing local account management across multiple machines across Windows Server and Entra ID (Azure AD) environments.
Connections import/export
There is a new and improved import/export connections tool. If you manage multiple WAC gateways and have the need to recover from a reinstall, this used to be a tedious process. Now, with the connections import/export process, it is much easier.
With this tool, you now have the following workflow to recover:
- Click the new Import Connections button
- Export a CSV of your current connection list which can include tags and group IDs
- Then, re-import the CSV on a new gateway or WAC instance
This drastically improves recovery times and cross-machine configuration setup.
Better VM storage settings
A new virtual storage management experience is on the way. However, this feature is not yet demo-ready from Microsoft. Do note some of the planned improvements and what these will include:
- VM disk details will be surfaced on the VM details page
- Add/remove storage controllers (e.g., SCSI) will be available
- You can add/remove/inspect/replace drives
- You can optimize disks and configure VM storage with better controls
These new features will help admins to troubleshoot and manage disk-related issues inside Windows Admin Center without having to jump to PowerShell or Hyper-V Manager instead.
Windows Admin Center in Azure
Windows Admin Center in Azure is officially available for IaaS VMs and in public preview for Azure Arc–enabled servers. With the new WAC in Azure, you can:
- Deploy and manage WAC in Azure with one click
- Use it as a single-pane-of-glass management of Azure VMs, etc
- Avoid the need for VPN or RDP connections to reach or manage on-prem servers.
- Azure-only features include:
- Azure RBAC access control
- Faster load times via the Azure CDN
- Automated certificate management
- Active Directory authentication
- Monthly updates
Arc integration is close to reaching general availability, and Microsoft has made note that it will be free for customers with Software Assurance or pay-as-you-go licenses. These will be usable until at least November 2025. This is the case even if you’re not on those plans yet.
Windows Admin Center 2410 and .NET Core 8
The latest Windows Admin Center 2410 release brings a major backend shift from .NET Framework 4.6.2 to .NET Core 8. This allows many improvements across the board, including:
- Faster performance and lower load times
- Modern cryptography for enhanced security
- HTTP/2 support
- A path toward potential future cross-platform support
However, this does come with changes for extension developers.
New requirements for extensions development for WAC
- All gateway plug-ins built for .NET Framework must be migrated to .NET Core 8
- Older plug-ins will not work on WAC 2410+
- Updated documentation and migration tools are available to support the transition
- The SDK is being updated for Angular 18, with a script to help extension developers upgrade
Microsoft is also requiring NuGet package signing and code signing for JavaScript/DLL files. This will help to enhance extension security.
Wrapping up
Windows Admin Center is certainly coming of age in 2025. Microsoft is obviously committed to the tool as the modern platform for management, both on-premises and in the cloud. The improvements we have covered show WAC in 2025 to be more performant, secure, and cloud-integrated.
It is great to see that there are many core improvements around virtual machine management as this has been a sore spot for Hyper-V admins for the past several years with Windows Admin Center. What’s clear is each new release is getting better and the platform is maturing rapidly with improvements that have been needed for quite some time.
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