by Microsoft Corporation · MIT
.NET is a free, cross-platform, open-source developer platform for building many different types of applications.
Microsoft publishes four different .NET downloads on the same page and they are easy to confuse. If an application told you to install .NET, the Desktop Runtime is almost certainly the one you want, and it is not the one the page pushes hardest.
The Desktop Runtime is what desktop applications need: it contains the base runtime plus the Windows Forms and WPF libraries that any normal Windows program uses to draw its interface.
The plain Runtime is smaller and lacks those interface libraries, so an application will start and then fail with a missing assembly. The ASP.NET Core Runtime is for web servers. The SDK is for writing .NET software, not running it, and is several times larger.
Architecture matters and the wrong one fails silently. Take x64 unless the application is specifically 32-bit, in which case you need x86 as well. Having both installed is normal.
An application built against .NET 8 needs the .NET 8 runtime specifically. Installing .NET 9 does not satisfy it, and both can be installed side by side without conflict. This is the single most common reason people install a runtime and get the same error again.
The download page lists "Run desktop apps" and "Run server apps" close together. Picking the wrong one produces an application that launches and immediately crashes looking for WPF or Windows Forms assemblies.
These URLs are the ones Microsoft Corporation declares in its own manifest. We do not proxy or shorten them, and we do not host a copy.
More than one architecture below. Check which one your Windows is if you are not sure.
Run this against the file on disk. If the output does not match the hash below, the file is not what Microsoft Corporation published. Delete it.
Windows · PowerShell
Get-FileHash "windowsdesktop-runtime-8.0.30-win-x64.exe" -Algorithm SHA256macOS · Linux
shasum -a 256 "windowsdesktop-runtime-8.0.30-win-x64.exe"Expected output
8bd710afa5de396c9eb2a3b68d00279b7b9aca372a2443e9acd4f48ffdef3f2d
Got a different hash, or one you cannot place? Paste it into the hash checker and it will tell you which program and version it belongs to, past releases included.
The unattended switch below is the one Microsoft Corporation declares in the installer manifest, not one we guessed by trying flags.
ARM64 · machine scope · publisher-declared
.\windowsdesktop-runtime-8.0.30-win-arm64.exe /quiet64-bit · machine scope · publisher-declared
.\windowsdesktop-runtime-8.0.30-win-x64.exe /quiet32-bit · machine scope · publisher-declared
.\windowsdesktop-runtime-8.0.30-win-x86.exe /quietRun it from the folder holding the downloaded file, in a terminal opened as administrator when the package installs for all users. Silent means no window and no prompts, so check the exit code rather than waiting for something to appear: 0 is success and 3010 means it worked but wants a reboot.
Silent install commands for every program we index · silent uninstall
Every guide on this tells you to hunt for the product code with Get-WmiObject or in the registry. You do not need to: it is published in the installer manifest, and it is printed below.
Product code · ARM64
{aaeeb2a9-2a46-4f98-b314-539a1136ae10}
Uninstall, with the usual prompts
msiexec /x {aaeeb2a9-2a46-4f98-b314-539a1136ae10}Silent, for deployment
msiexec /x {aaeeb2a9-2a46-4f98-b314-539a1136ae10} /qn /norestartProduct code · 64-bit
{d374321a-d08b-4207-8ef4-6953f782a26c}
Uninstall, with the usual prompts
msiexec /x {d374321a-d08b-4207-8ef4-6953f782a26c}Silent, for deployment
msiexec /x {d374321a-d08b-4207-8ef4-6953f782a26c} /qn /norestartProduct code · 32-bit
{43defb57-5b36-443a-ae84-197dc6b00476}
Uninstall, with the usual prompts
msiexec /x {43defb57-5b36-443a-ae84-197dc6b00476}Silent, for deployment
msiexec /x {43defb57-5b36-443a-ae84-197dc6b00476} /qn /norestartThe codes above belong to Microsoft .NET Windows Desktop Runtime 8.0 8.0.30, the version in our index. If you have an older release installed, its code is different and this command will report that the product is not installed. In that case run Get-Package -Name "Microsoft*" in PowerShell to read the code of what you actually have.
This removes the program as the publisher packaged it. Settings and files created after installation, typically under AppData, are deliberately left behind by the uninstaller and have to be deleted by hand if you want them gone.
Reinstalling and hitting error 1638? That is this same product code, and the command above is the fix.
Product codes for every program we index, with the msiexec switches and how to read the code off your own machine.
| Signal | Finding | Points |
|---|---|---|
| SHA-256 hash published | 3 of 3 installers ship a SHA-256 hashWithout a published hash there is no way to prove the file you downloaded is the file the publisher built. | 30 / 30 |
| Binary provenance | 3 on the publisher's own domainThe strongest signal against a repackaged installer: the file should come from the publisher, not from a mirror nobody vouches for. | 35 / 35 |
| Served over HTTPS | 3 of 3 over HTTPSAn installer fetched over plain HTTP can be modified in transit. | 15 / 15 |
| Licence declared | MITA declared licence tells you what you are actually allowed to do with the software. | 5 / 5 |
Yes, in the sense we can actually verify: the installer downloads from microsoft.com, which is a domain we have tied to Microsoft Corporation.
Every one of the 3 installers on this page comes with the SHA-256 Microsoft Corporation declared, so you do not have to take our word for it: hash the file you downloaded and compare.
What this does not tell you is whether the software itself is any good, or whether you want what it does once installed. A publisher can ship something you would rather not run and the download is still authentic. We answer the question we can measure and leave the other one to you.
If Windows says “Windows protected your PC” when you run it, that is SmartScreen reporting reputation, not a malware verdict — it shows up on perfectly legitimate software from small publishers and on releases that are simply new. The reverse matters more: no warning does not mean the file was checked.
How the 100/100 score is calculated · why the source matters more than the reputation
Windows ships with a package manager, and this program is in it. The identifier below is the one Microsoft's repository uses, which is also where the download URL and hash on this page come from.
Install
winget install --id Microsoft.DotNet.DesktopRuntime.8 --exactUpgrade later
winget upgrade --id Microsoft.DotNet.DesktopRuntime.8Why --exact: without it winget matches on name as well as identifier, and a search that returns more than one package makes it stop and ask rather than install. Pinning the identifier is what makes the command safe to put in a script.
Not installing anything, or getting an error back? The commands that actually come up covers upgrading everything at once, what --include-unknown is for, and why winget can be missing from a machine that should have it.
The version history of Microsoft .NET Windows Desktop Runtime 8.0, each release with the download URL the publisher declared at the time and the SHA-256 to check it against. Useful when an update breaks something and you need to downgrade to a build that worked.
We do not host any of these files and never re-upload them, which is the difference between this and an old-version download site.
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The file names, so you can tell what you have. Their hashes are in the hash checker and in the downloadable archive.
Publishers take old builds offline without warning, so a link here can stop working even though the hash stays correct forever. If you already have the file, the hash is what matters: it tells you whether what you have is what they published.
Every Microsoft .NET Windows Desktop Runtime 8.0 version with a published manifest, newest first. The most recent ones are listed above with their file names and hashes.
Matched on the categories Microsoft Corporation and others declare in their own manifests, so the grouping is theirs rather than ours. Each one has its official URL and hash on the same terms as this page.
Not related to Microsoft .NET Windows Desktop Runtime 8.0 — just other entries, each with its own official URL and published hash.