Blog Post

Screenshot of higher IOPS when running Native NVMe stack on Windows Server 2025.
Windows Server News and Best Practices
5 MIN READ

Announcing Native NVMe in Windows Server 2025: Ushering in a New Era of Storage Performance

Yash_Shekar's avatar
Yash_Shekar
Icon for Microsoft rankMicrosoft
Dec 15, 2025

Native NVMe support in Windows Server 2025 is a leap forward in storage innovation that will redefine what’s possible for your most demanding workloads. Enable Native NVMe today using a registry key after applying October’s latest cumulative update for WS2025!

We’re thrilled to announce the arrival of Native NVMe support in Windows Server 2025—a leap forward in storage innovation that will redefine what’s possible for your most demanding workloads. Modern ...
Updated Dec 15, 2025
Version 1.0
NVME SSD
storage
windows server
Kevin256's avatar
Kevin256
Copper Contributor
Dec 20, 2025

I don't understand this post. Windows had native NVMe support since Windows 8.1 (and Windows 7 with a patch applied). Since Windows Server is based on the same codebase, Windows Server 2008R2/2012R2 onwards had support too. I can install Windows 11/Windows Server 2025 on a NVMe drive today and get full speed no problem. 

Can someone explain this for me? Is that any different than what we already have today? I'm lost... 

  • RozinhaK's avatar
    RozinhaK
    Copper Contributor
    Dec 21, 2025

    It supports, but is not native; it's like a translation layer from NVMe to SCSI.

    For example, if you search for 'Device Manager' in the Windows Start menu (Or Windows + X>Device Manager) and open 'Storage Controllers' or 'Disk Drive', then go to 'Details' > 'Driver Class', the 'Value' will appear as 'SCSI Adapter'.

    On the other hand, if Win 11/Server has the 'fix' for NVMe enabled, it will appear as 'NVMe Disk'.

     

    • Kevin256's avatar
      Kevin256
      Copper Contributor
      Dec 21, 2025

      Oh, got it! I appreciate your explanation, RozinhaK. 

      Knowing that makes me wonder why MS wouldn't implement NVMe support properly when it debuted on the OS 12 years ago. This company relies too much on legacy tech, even when it could start on the right track from the beginning. Sad!

  • Squall_Leonhart's avatar
    Squall_Leonhart
    Copper Contributor
    Dec 21, 2025

    msahci and stornvme implement sata and nvme command sets as SCSI rather than native.

    Reading more than the title would have answered the question, and theres even pictures available to keep your attention span.

    • Kevin256's avatar
      Kevin256
      Copper Contributor
      Dec 21, 2025

      I read all the article, not just the title. 

       

      I could be missing something, so, respectfully, help me here: If NVMe commands are translated to SCSI/SATA ones, why Windows always had huge gains when using it on NVMe drives? That translation should bottleneck performance and other capabilities.

       

      If Microsoft took this long to embrace a "new" storage technology properly and all that we had until now was inefficient code running (simulating the new tech), with many other problems occurring on Windows 11 every month, no wonder Linux is eating the desktop space bit by bit... In this case, this news is a decade late, and it's not news at all.