Microsoft announced earlier this year that it would end support for the Microsoft .Net Framework 4, 4.5 and 4.5.1 on January 12, 2016. End of support means that these .Net versions won’t receive security updates, technical support or hotfixes anymore.
The discontinuation of support won’t affect the following versions of the framework: 3.5, 4.5.2, 4.6 and 4.6.1.
Unlike previously released versions of the .Net Framework, these supported versions are defined as components instead of independent products by Microsoft. Components are supported for the lifecycle of the operating system they are available for which means that the listed .Net versions that are still supported by Microsoft after January 12, 2016 are supported for as long as the underlying version of Windows is supported.
Supported .Net versions running on a system with Windows Vista will be supported until April 11, 2017 for instance, while the same versions are supported until October 14, 2025 on systems running Windows 10.
System administrators and end users need to ensure that a supported version of the .Net Framework is installed on devices they manage or use. In most cases, this means updating the .Net Framework 4.x to version 4.5.2, 4.6 or 4.6.1.
Determining the .Net Framework version
The Windows Registry reveals which version of the .Net Framework is installed on a computer system.
- Tap on the Windows-key, type regedit and hit enter.
- Confirm the UAC prompt if it is displayed.
- This should open the Windows Registry Editor.
- Navigate to the key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftNET Framework SetupNDPv4Full
- Locate the release key on the right, and check its value against the table below
| 378389 | .NET Framework 4.5 |
| 378675 | .NET Framework 4.5.1 installed with Windows 8.1 or Windows Server 2012 R2 |
| 378758 | .NET Framework 4.5.1 installed on Windows 8, Windows 7 SP1, or Windows Vista SP2 |
| 379893 | .NET Framework 4.5.2 |
| 393295 (Windows 10) or 393297 (All other OS versions) | .NET Framework 4.6 |
| 394256 | .NET Framework 4.6.1 |
System administrators and users find downloads for supported versions of the Microsoft .Net Framework on the following sites (offline installers only).
- .Net Framework 4.5.2
- .Net Framework 4.6
- .Net Framework 4.6.1
End users can run the installer on their system to update the framework to the selected version. All available versions will be supported by Microsoft until the operating system reaches its end of support.
Additional information about the move, including changes in newer versions of the .Net Framework that may impact applications and code, are provided on the official Microsoft Dotnet blog linked in the first paragraph of this article.
Now You: Which version of .Net is installed on your system? Do you use .Net applications?