GetVersion function (sysinfoapi.h)

GetVersion may be altered or unavailable for releases after WindowsВ 8.1. Instead, use the Version Helper functions. For Windows 10 apps, please see Targeting your applications for Windows.

With the release of WindowsВ 8.1, the behavior of the GetVersion API has changed in the value it will return for the operating system version. The value returned by the GetVersion function now depends on how the application is manifested.

Applications not manifested for WindowsВ 8.1 or WindowsВ 10 will return the WindowsВ 8 OS version value (6.2). Once an application is manifested for a given operating system version, GetVersion will always return the version that the application is manifested for in future releases. To manifest your applications for WindowsВ 8.1 or WindowsВ 10, refer to Targeting your application for Windows.

Syntax

Parameters

This function has no parameters.

Return value

If the function succeeds, the return value includes the major and minor version numbers of the operating system in the low-order word, and information about the operating system platform in the high-order word.

For all platforms, the low-order word contains the version number of the operating system. The low-order byte of this word specifies the major version number, in hexadecimal notation. The high-order byte specifies the minor version (revision) number, in hexadecimal notation. The high-order bit is zero, the next 7 bits represent the build number, and the low-order byte is 5.

Remarks

The GetVersionEx function was developed because many existing applications err when examining the packed DWORD value returned by GetVersion, transposing the major and minor version numbers. GetVersionEx forces applications to explicitly examine each element of version information. VerifyVersionInfo eliminates further potential for error by comparing the required system version with the current system version for you.

Examples

The following code fragment illustrates how to extract information from the GetVersion return value: OSVERSIONINFOEX

Find windows OS version from command line

Windows has command line utilities that show us the version of the Windows OS running on the computer, including the service pack number. There are multiple CMD commands that help with finding this, you can pick the one that suits your need. Ver command can show you the OS version whereas Systeminfo command can additionally give you service pack, OS edition and build number etc.

Find OS Version and Service Pack number from CMD

As you can see above, ver command shows only OS version but not the service pack number. We can find service pack number as well with Systeminfo command. Systeminfo dumps lot of other information too, which we can filter out using findstr command.

This command works on XP, Vista and Windows 7 and on Server editions also. Find below example for Win7.

In case of Windows 7 SP1, the output would be slightly different as below.

If you want to print more details, then you can use just ‘OS’ in the findstr search pattern. See example below for Server 2008.

Check Windows version using WMIC command

Run the below WMIC command to get OS version and the service pack number.

Example on Windows 7:

If you want to find just the OS version, you can use ver command. Open command window and execute ver command. But note that this does not show service pack version.

This command does not show version on a Windows 7 system.

What version of Windows do I have?

As a Windows user, it’s important to know which operating system version you are using. You need this information when installing new programs and also for troubleshooting.

Microsoft provides details about the Windows version installed on your computer in several places in the operating system, e.g. in the Control Panel. There are three different ways of accessing the relevant system information. Let’s take a look at them now.

Checking your Windows version using a keyboard shortcut

The quickest way to find out your Windows version is using a keyboard shortcut. On newer systems, the steps are as follows:

1. Simultaneously press the [Windows] key and the [Pause] key.
2. A system information window will appear.

Under the heading “View basic information about your computer”, you will see the name of your operating system, e.g. Windows 10 Enterprise.

The window also contains an overview of the technical characteristics of your system, for example: processor architecture, installed memory (RAM) and system type (i.e. 32-bit or 64-bit). The next section shows the name of your computer and network domain settings. You can also see whether or not your Windows version is activated.

The system information window therefore contains all the information you need in order to install new programs.

However, it does not give you detailed information about your Windows version, such as the version number or the OS build number. You need this information if you want to check whether your operating system has all of the latest updates for example.

The [Windows] key + [Pause] key shortcut does not work on older Windows systems.

How to get Windows version from command prompt or from PowerShell

But is there a way to get the exact version string using command line output similar to the one mentioned in the image?

The attached is the output of «winver» command from run. PS: I am looking for a batch or PowerShell command.

There are some alternates available to get the Windows version like this PowerShell command:

6 Answers 6

The following commands are is going to help you with that. If you need more information, just type in systeminfo:

The ver command shows something like this:

But in PowerShell (or Git Bash) you have to call it through the cmd command:

I found it somewhere, PowerShell:

To add to @Bonifacio ‘s answer:

Would be even better, because it returns only the ReleaseId value, which you could then pipe to a file. Especially useful if you have several hosts to deal with.

With system information you can only get the build with that value and go to Google to get the respective version.

However, one simple way is by searching the registry on the command line:

The reg query way suggested all output a little garbage.

Using a for loop with tokens will output clean information.

The tokens=3 refers to the third word from the original output.

You will need to double the % if running inside a bat file.

You can set the output as a variable by replacing echo %i with set build=%i

Also remember to escape ^ any special characters.

Lastly look at HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion for the string that has the required value. You may need to adjust the token count.

Operating System Version

The Version API Helper functions are used to determine the version of the operating system that is currently running. For more information, see Getting the System Version.

The following table summarizes the most recent operating system version numbers.

Operating system	Version number
Windows 10	10.0*
Windows Server 2019	10.0*
Windows Server 2016	10.0*
Windows 8.1	6.3*
Windows Server 2012 R2	6.3*
Windows 8	6.2
Windows Server 2012	6.2
Windows 7	6.1
Windows Server 2008 R2	6.1
Windows Server 2008	6.0
Windows Vista	6.0
Windows Server 2003 R2	5.2
Windows Server 2003	5.2
Windows XP 64-Bit Edition	5.2
Windows XP	5.1
Windows 2000	5.0

* For applications that have been manifested for Windows 8.1 or Windows 10. Applications not manifested for Windows 8.1 or Windows 10 will return the Windows 8 OS version value (6.2). To manifest your applications for Windows 8.1 or Windows 10, refer to Targeting your application for Windows.

Identifying the current operating system is usually not the best way to determine whether a particular operating system feature is present. This is because the operating system may have had new features added in a redistributable DLL. Rather than using the Version API Helper functions to determine the operating system platform or version number, test for the presence of the feature itself.

To determine the best way to test for a feature, refer to the documentation for the feature of interest. The following list discusses some common techniques for feature detection:

• You can test for the presence of the functions associated with a feature. To test for the presence of a function in a system DLL, call the LoadLibrary function to load the DLL. Then call the GetProcAddress function to determine whether the function of interest is present in the DLL. Use the pointer returned by GetProcAddress to call the function. Note that even if the function is present, it may be a stub that just returns an error code such as ERROR_CALL_NOT_IMPLEMENTED.
• You can determine the presence of some features by using the GetSystemMetrics function. For example, you can detect multiple display monitors by calling GetSystemMetrics(SM_CMONITORS).
• There are several versions of the redistributable DLLs that implement shell and common control features. For information about determining which versions are present on the system your application is running on, see the topic Shell and Common Controls Versions.

If you must require a particular operating system, be sure to use it as a minimum supported version, rather than design the test for the one operating system. This way, your detection code will continue to work on future versions of Windows.

Note that a 32-bit application can detect whether it is running under WOW64 by calling the IsWow64Process function. It can obtain additional processor information by calling the GetNativeSystemInfo function.