Windows Internet Name Service

Windows Internet Name Service (WINS), introduced in 1994 with Windows NT 3.5, is a Microsoft networking technology for translating NetBIOS names to IP addresses, that is, it helped computers on a network find each other by a name. The service is mostly unnecessary for modern networks unless support is needed for legacy systems requiring it. The rise of DNS, especially through Microsoft's own Active Directory service's DNS support, effectively made WINS obsolete by the mid-2000s. As of 2025, WINS has not been deprecated although Microsoft advises against new deployments.^[1]

Details

WINS is Microsoft's implementation of the NetBIOS Name Service (NBNS), a name server and service for NetBIOS computer names. Effectively, WINS is to NetBIOS names what DNS is to domain names — a central mapping of host names to network addresses. Like the DNS, it is implemented in two parts, a server service (that manages the embedded Jet Database, server to server replication, service requests, and conflicts) and a TCP/IP client component which manages the client's registration and renewal of names, and takes care of queries. Basically, Windows Internet Name Service (WINS) is a legacy computer name registration and resolution service that maps computer NetBIOS names to IP addresses.