Windows 11 Enterprise to Get First Hotpatch Next Week

At Ignite 2024, Microsoft revealed that it would bring a “revolutionary” new Hotpatch feature to Windows 11 Enterprise version 24H2. This week, the company alerted its business customers that the first of these updates will soon be available and explained how it will work.

“The first Windows 11 hotpatch update since general availability is coming to enterprises in the second week of May 2025,” the Microsoft Learn site explains. “With hotpatch updates, you can quickly take measures to help protect your organization from cyberattacks, while minimizing user disruptions.”

Live hotpatching debuted as a new feature in Windows Server 2025 in early November 2024, and Microsoft will utilize an identical hotpatching schedule for Windows 11 Enterprise 24H2: There will be four quarterly cumulative updates each year that require a rebooting, as is normally the case, and then the interim cumulative updates will be issued as hotpatches that build off the quarterly “baseline” update and do not require a reboot. Where “normal” cumulative updates can include new features and security updates, hotpatches only include security updates.

The Patch Tuesday update that arrives next week will be a hotpatch on Windows 11 Enterprise 24H2, but you must have first installed the April baseline cumulative update to install it without rebooting. And IT admins need to enable this feature, too, via a Windows Autopatch policy in the Microsoft Intune console.

In addition to Windows 11 Enterprise 24H2 and Intune, Hotpatch requires a Microsoft subscription that includes Windows 11 Enterprise E3, E5, or F3, Windows 11 Education A3 or A5, or a Windows 365 Enterprise subscription. A Copilot+ PC is not required.

You can learn more on the Microsoft Tech Community forums.