How to Change the Default Distribution in Windows Subsystem for Linux

Default distribution in Windows Subsystem for Linux

In some cases, you want to run more than one Linux distro in WSL. Note the asterisk, the WSL distro with the asterisk is the default distro for you.

PS C:\> wsl -l -v
  NAME          STATE           VERSION
* Ubuntu        Stopped         2
  kali-linux    Stopped         2
  Debian        Stopped         2

And when you run wsl command without any additional parameter, the default one will be start.

PS C:\> wsl
To run a command as administrator (user "root"), use "sudo <command>".
See "man sudo_root" for details.

bon@DESKTOP-DL81K4A:/mnt/c/Windows/system32$ exit
logout
PS C:\> wsl -l -v
  NAME          STATE           VERSION
* Ubuntu        Running         2
  kali-linux    Stopped         2
  Debian        Stopped         2

Change default distribution in WSL

To change the default distribution, let’s run wsl with –set-default parameter.

PS C:\> wsl --set-default debian
PS C:\> wsl -l -v
  NAME          STATE           VERSION
* Debian        Stopped         2
  Ubuntu        Stopped         2
  kali-linux    Stopped         2

PS C:\> wsl
bon@DESKTOP-DL81K4A:/mnt/c/Windows/system32$ exit
logout
PS C:\> wsl -l -v
  NAME          STATE           VERSION
* Debian        Running         2
  Ubuntu        Stopped         2
  kali-linux    Stopped         2