Wireguard Developer Working on Windows Kernel Deployment

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VPN service WireGuard will have a separate implementation for the Windows kernel. The software is ported from the Linux kernel version. According to the makers, the software is therefore six times faster than the current version, especially via WiFi connections.

WireguardNT is a direct port of the software’s Linux codebase, according to the developers. It concerns an implementation of the vpn that is directly available for the Windows kernel. Currently, WireGuard for Windows uses a Go codebase that works cross platform, with a TUN driver called wintun. By being implemented directly in the kernel, there is no need to first address that codebase and communicate via the driver. That makes the VPN a lot faster, say the makers.

The developers say they can achieve a maximum speed of 7.5Gbit/s on a wired connection during a test, although they admit that this is of little relevance for most users. The real gain would be in Wi-Fi connections. Using wireguard-nt, it would be as fast as the old WireGuard connection over an Ethernet connection, and more than six times faster than a Wi-Fi connection without wireguard-nt. The makers say they will optimize the protocol even further in the future. “But just by being in the kernel, we’re lowering the latency and eliminating the switch problems we’re having now.”

The kernel version of WireGuard is still in its early stages. The makers call it ‘experimental’. Three more development phases are needed before wireguard-nt can be made available, which will permanently remove the old codebase from the Windows client. The developers do not say when that will happen.

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