description: Learn how to host an ASP.NET Core application in a Windows Service.
keywords: ASP.NET Core, Windows service, hosting
ms.author: tdykstra
manager: wpickett
ms.date: 03/30/2017
ms.topic: article
ms.assetid: d9a65066-d7cb-47df-b046-64629c4d2c6f
ms.technology: aspnet
ms.prod: aspnet-core
uid: hosting/windows-service
---
# Host an ASP.NET Core app in a Windows Service
By [Tom Dykstra](https://github.com/tdykstra)
The recommended way to host an ASP.NET Core app on Windows when you don't use IIS is to run it in a [Windows Service](https://msdn.microsoft.com/library/d56de412). That way it can automatically start after reboots and crashes, without waiting for someone to log in.
[View or download sample code](https://github.com/aspnet/Docs/tree/master/aspnetcore/hosting/windows-service/sample) See the [Next Steps](#next-steps) section for instructions on how to run it.
## Prerequisites
* The app must run on the .NET framework runtime. In the *.csproj* file, specify appropriate values for [TargetFramework](https://docs.microsoft.com/nuget/schema/target-frameworks) and [RuntimeIdentifier](https://docs.microsoft.com/dotnet/articles/core/rid-catalog). Here's an example:
When creating a project in Visual Studio, use the **ASP.NET Core Application (.NET Framework)** template.
* If the app will get requests from the internet (not just from an internal network), it must use the [WebListener](xref:fundamentals/servers/weblistener) web server rather than [Kestrel](xref:fundamentals/servers/kestrel). Kestrel must be used with IIS for edge deployments. For more information, see [When to use Kestrel with a reverse proxy](xref:fundamentals/servers/kestrel#when-to-use-kestrel-with-a-reverse-proxy).
## Getting started
This section explains the minimum changes required to set up an existing ASP.NET Core project to run in a service.
* Install the NuGet package [Microsoft.AspNetCore.Hosting.WindowsServices](https://www.nuget.org/packages/Microsoft.AspNetCore.Hosting.WindowsServices/).
* Make the following changes in `Program.Main`:
* Call `host.RunAsService` instead of `host.Run`.
* If your code calls `UseContentRoot`, use a path to the publish location instead of `Directory.GetCurrentDirectory()`
Use [dotnet publish](https://docs.microsoft.com/dotnet/articles/core/tools/dotnet-publish) or a [Visual Studio publish profile](xref:publishing/web-publishing-vs) that publishes to a folder.
* Test by creating and starting the service.
Open an administrator command prompt window to use the [sc.exe](https://technet.microsoft.com/library/bb490995) command-line tool to create and start a service.
If you name your service MyService, you publish your app to `c:\svc`, and the app itself is named AspNetCoreService, the commands would look like this:
The `binPath` value is the path to your app's executable, including the executable filename itself.
When these commands finish, you can browse to the same path as when you run as a console app (by default, `http://localhost:5000`)
## Provide a way to run outside of a service
It's easier to test and debug when you're running outside of a service, so it's customary to add code that calls `host.RunAsService` only under certain conditions. For example, you could run as a console app if you get a `--console` command-line argument or if the debugger is attached.
If your custom `WebHostService` code needs to get a service from dependency injection (such as a logger), you can get it from the `Services` property of `IWebHost`.
The [sample application](https://github.com/aspnet/Docs/tree/master/aspnetcore/hosting/windows-service/sample) that accompanies this article is a simple MVC web app that has been modified as shown in preceding code examples. To run it in a service, do the following steps:
* In a browser, go to http://localhost:5000 to verify that it's running.
If the app doesn't start up as expected when running in a service, a quick way to make error messages accessible is to add a logging provider such as the [Windows EventLog provider](xref:fundamentals/logging#eventlog).
## Acknowledgments
This article was written with the help of sources that were already published. The earliest and most useful of them were these:
* [Hosting ASP.NET Core as Windows service](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/37346383/hosting-asp-net-core-as-windows-service/37464074#37464074)
* [How to host your ASP.NET Core in a Windows Service](http://dotnetthoughts.net/how-to-host-your-aspnet-core-in-a-windows-service/)
