When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Heres how it works.
Unlike a traditional virtual machine, WSL interacts directly with your Windows installation.
If any issues arise, it’s possible for you to easily reset it and begin anew.
Distros are easy to install on WSL, and to remove, but you need to know the right steps.
But how do you actually remove a Linux distro installed inWSL?
If you simply do this, then you’ll still have an entire file system left behind.
And it’s not possible for custom distros installed from outside the Microsoft Store.
Checking installed WSL distros and their current state using PowerShell.
Here’s how to completely remove a Linux distro from WSL.
But this doesn’t completely remove all traces.
So do the uninstalling of the app second, ideally.
Exporting your WSL distros to a backup only takes a single command and a couple of minutes.
Here’s what you should probably do.
Though this will depend on which package you installed in the first instance.
Backing up is a pretty straightforward process that involves exporting to a .tar file.
