Should IIS version 10 from Win11 support HTTP/3?

Question

Should IIS version 10 from Win11 support HTTP/3?

Gertraud 0

I have setup Internet Information Services Version 10.0.22621.1 which comes with Windows 11 to work as basic web server. Basically, everything works fine, and TLS 1.3 client and server support supported is enabled. Issue is that I cannot get HTTP/3 connection established. HTTP/3 support for IIS is enabled. QUIC (Port 443/UDP) traffic is allowed, HTTP Header looks correct and TTP/3 support for IIS is enabled, TLS cipher is set, etc... I have tried to follow any guides which I have find, e.g., https://woshub.com/enable-http-3-iis-windows/. I'm out of ideas.

Yurong Dai-MSFT 2,871 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff

2023-07-24T05:55:32.75+00:00

Hi @Gertraud,

Microsoft IIS support for HTTP/3 is enabled natively with Windows Server 2022/Windows 11. How do you know that you cannot get HTTP/3 connection established. Did you encounter any errors? Please post more details about your problem.
Gertraud 0 Reputation points

2023-07-25T01:53:45.24+00:00

Thank you for your response and confirm that HTTP/3 support is native to Windows Server 2022 and Windows 11. I am unsure if HTTP/3 is enabled or functioning correctly.

To validate HTTP/3 support, I used an online tool called "HTTP/3 Check". When I ran the test, the tool was unable to confirm HTTP/3 support. Additionally, the IIS logs only showed standard HTTP/1.1 or HTTP/2 traffic, and no HTTP/3 traffic.

After executing all steps from the first post "Enable HTTP/3 Support for IIS on Windows Server 2022"-link, I attempted to enable HTTP/3 by running the command Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName IIS-HttpProtocolSettings in PowerShell, but I received an error stating that the feature name IIS-HttpProtocolSettings is unknown. I also checked the status of Windows features using the Get-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online command in PowerShell, but I did not see any features related to HTTP/3.

I did not encounter any specific errors related to HTTP/3, but the lack of confirmation from the online tool and the absence of HTTP/3 traffic in the IIS logs led me to believe that HTTP/3 might not be enabled or functioning correctly. I have also used the Network Monitor tool in the Microsoft Edge browser to inspect the protocol used for connections to my server. While other sites (e.g., YouTube) show HTTP/3 (H3) connections, my server only shows HTTP/2 (H2) connections.

I would appreciate any guidance on how to confirm if HTTP/3 is enabled on my server, and if not, how to enable it. Thank you for your assistance.
Kimbo Slice 10 Reputation points

2024-01-26T18:42:42.94+00:00

http3 is NOT enabled by default. there are two registry keys needed to enable it. please do not provide incorrect information on these help forums if you do not know. this forum is so packed with misinformation.

Heres the correct information on enabling it

2 answers

Your answer

Yurong Dai-MSFT 2,871 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff

2023-07-24T05:55:32.75+00:00

Hi @Gertraud,

Microsoft IIS support for HTTP/3 is enabled natively with Windows Server 2022/Windows 11. How do you know that you cannot get HTTP/3 connection established. Did you encounter any errors? Please post more details about your problem.
Gertraud 0 Reputation points

2023-07-25T01:53:45.24+00:00

Thank you for your response and confirm that HTTP/3 support is native to Windows Server 2022 and Windows 11. I am unsure if HTTP/3 is enabled or functioning correctly.

To validate HTTP/3 support, I used an online tool called "HTTP/3 Check". When I ran the test, the tool was unable to confirm HTTP/3 support. Additionally, the IIS logs only showed standard HTTP/1.1 or HTTP/2 traffic, and no HTTP/3 traffic.

After executing all steps from the first post "Enable HTTP/3 Support for IIS on Windows Server 2022"-link, I attempted to enable HTTP/3 by running the command Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName IIS-HttpProtocolSettings in PowerShell, but I received an error stating that the feature name IIS-HttpProtocolSettings is unknown. I also checked the status of Windows features using the Get-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online command in PowerShell, but I did not see any features related to HTTP/3.

I did not encounter any specific errors related to HTTP/3, but the lack of confirmation from the online tool and the absence of HTTP/3 traffic in the IIS logs led me to believe that HTTP/3 might not be enabled or functioning correctly. I have also used the Network Monitor tool in the Microsoft Edge browser to inspect the protocol used for connections to my server. While other sites (e.g., YouTube) show HTTP/3 (H3) connections, my server only shows HTTP/2 (H2) connections.

I would appreciate any guidance on how to confirm if HTTP/3 is enabled on my server, and if not, how to enable it. Thank you for your assistance.
Kimbo Slice 10 Reputation points

2024-01-26T18:42:42.94+00:00

http3 is NOT enabled by default. there are two registry keys needed to enable it. please do not provide incorrect information on these help forums if you do not know. this forum is so packed with misinformation.

Heres the correct information on enabling it

Answer 1

Has anyone managed to get HTTP/3 working with Windows 11?

I am currently running a server on Windows 11 with IIS version 10.0 (this is the version that comes with it.). I am trying to enable HTTP/3 support on my server, but I am encountering an issue when trying to use the Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature command.

When I run the following command in PowerShell:

Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName HTTP3 -All

I receive the following error message:

Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature : Feature name HTTP3 is unknown.
At line:1 char:1
+ Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName HTTP3 -All
+ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : NotSpecified: (:) [Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature], COMException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : Microsoft.Dism.Commands.EnableWindowsOptionalFeatureCommand

Could you please provide guidance on how to resolve this issue? Is there a different method or command I should be using to enable HTTP/3 support on my Windows 11 IIS server?

Thank you for your assistance.

Yurong Dai-MSFT 2,871 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff

2023-07-27T07:56:36.39+00:00

Hi @Gertraud,

It is difficult to reproduce your problem based on your description, I suggest you open a case via: https://support.microsoft.com.

Answer 2

Yurong Dai-MSFT 2,871 Microsoft External Staff

Hi @Gertraud,

HTTP/3 is a major change to HTTP. It switches away from using TCP as a transport and TLS separately to using QUIC as a transport which has TLS 1.3 or higher built in. These changes mean that migrating from HTTP/2 to HTTP/3 can uncover unexpected issues due to previously non-problematic configurations.

This blog provides detailed steps for troubleshooting HTTP/3 in http.sys. I hope this helps you.

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Best regards,

Yurong Dai

Gertraud 0 Reputation points

2023-07-25T14:12:27.8433333+00:00

Dear Yurong,

I have been attempting to establish an HTTP/3 connection with my server but have been encountering difficulties. I have followed the steps outlined in your documentation and have enabled HTTP/3 in my server settings. However, when testing the connection using online tools such as the "HTTP/3 Check" website, I receive a message stating that a QUIC connection could not be established.

I have also checked the server logs and found that the server is responding with HTTP/1.1 200 OK, indicating that the server is operational but not serving content over HTTP/3. The "alt-svc" header is set to h3=":443"; ma=86400; persist=1, which should indicate to clients that HTTP/3 is available on port 443.

In addition, I have used the Microsoft Edge browser's developer tools to monitor the protocol used when connecting to my server. The Network tab in these tools shows that the connection is being made using HTTP/2, not HTTP/3.

I have also checked the server's TLS settings in the Windows Registry, and all necessary protocols (TLS 1.0, TLS 1.1, TLS 1.2, and TLS 1.3) are enabled. I have also added SSL 3.0 to the registry, although I understand that this protocol is not required for HTTP/3.

I have used Wireshark to monitor the network traffic between my server and the "HTTP/3 Check" website. The logs show that certain ports are unreachable, but it doesn't provide specific information about why an HTTP/3 connection could not be established. HTTP/3 uses the QUIC protocol, which operates over UDP, not TCP. If there are issues with UDP connectivity, that could potentially explain why HTTP/3 isn't working.

I understand that HTTP/3 is a major change to HTTP, as it switches away from using TCP as a transport and TLS separately to using QUIC as a transport which has TLS 1.3 or higher built in. I am aware that these changes mean that migrating from HTTP/2 to HTTP/3 can uncover unexpected issues due to previously non-problematic configurations.

I have read the blog post on troubleshooting HTTP/3 in http.sys and followed the steps provided, but I am still unable to establish an HTTP/3 connection. I would appreciate any further assistance or insight you can provide.

Best regards,
Gertraud
Yurong Dai-MSFT 2,871 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff

2023-07-26T07:52:14.4733333+00:00
Hi @Gertraud,

QUIC and HTTP/3 are fairly complex protocols. Even if you've set up an HTTP/3 compliant server and are using a newer browser, you might be surprised to learn that HTTP/3 isn't actually used consistently. When you navigate to example.com (a website you've never visited before), and you've used DNS to resolve it to an IP. You send one or more QUIC handshake packets to this IP. Now several things can go wrong:

The server might not support QUIC.

One of the intermediate networks or firewalls might block QUIC and/or UDP completely.

The handshake packets might be lost in transit.

The browser may first use HTTP/1 or HTTP/2 when connecting to a server. The server may advertise support of HTTP/3 for subsequent connections. However, even after several requests, the browser may end up using HTTP/2 and TCP if QUIC handshake is delayed for some reason.

Next to the challenges involved with setting up HTTP/3 and QUIC on the server-side, there are also difficulties in getting browsers to use the new protocols consistently. This is due to a two-step discovery process involving the Alt-Svc HTTP header and the fact that HTTP/2 connections cannot simply be “upgraded” to HTTP/3, because the latter uses UDP.

However, even if the server supports HTTP/3, clients (and website owners) need to deal with the fact that intermediate networks may block UDP and/or QUIC traffic. Therefore, HTTP/3 will never fully replace HTTP/2. In fact, maintaining a well-tuned HTTP/2 setup is still necessary for first-time visitors and visitors on non-permissive networks.

This post details the challenges involved in deploying and testing HTTP/3, and if you read it in its entirety, you might get some inspiration. Practical HTTP/3 Deployment Options

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Should IIS version 10 from Win11 support HTTP/3?

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