Microsoft’s WinGet Package Manager is currently experiencing issues installing or upgrading packages after WinGet CDN’s SSL/TLS certificate expires.

Released May 2020the open source Windows Package Manager (WinGet) allows users to install applications directly from the command line.

WinDet down after CDN SSL expires

Starting late Saturday evening, Windows users started reporting issues when trying to install or upgrade apps through WinGet.

Tiger Wang, WinGet user shared a screenshot on GitHub of their command line throwing an “InternetOpenUrl() failed” error when trying to run simple WinGet commands, such as:

winget upgrade --all --verbose.

This report was supported by another user who also had the problem. The problem seems to be related to WinGet CDN’s SSL/TLS certificate which has now expired.

When you navigate to the CDN URL, https://cdn.winget.microsoft.com in Chrome, BleepingComputer received the following error:

The warning and certificate details confirm that the WinGet CDN certificate ceased to be valid over the weekend:

What is a temporary solution?

Until Microsoft renews the SSL certificate, WinGet users can rest easy knowing that there is another workaround to resolve the situation.

This involves adding the following source URL to WinGet’s source list, instead of just relying on cdn.winget.microsoft.com. This way WinGet can fetch packages from this alternate server which has a valid certificate at the time of writing.

https://winget.azureedge.net/cache

“You can add a source like https://winget.azureedge.net/cache using the command below,” GitHub user qilme informed.

sudo winget source add -n winget https://winget.azureedge.net/cache

THE winget tool source command allows users to manage Windows Package Manager sources. With the source command, one can add, list, modify, delete, reset or export repositories used by WinGet.

Note: When running the above command, “sudo” is not required if the command is run in PowerShell by an administrator account. If you encounter errors, try remove default WinGet source before adding the new azure edge link.

THE azure edge The URL in question is an alias for WinGet’s CDN, but with a valid certificate that makes it a viable solution for WinGet developers:

After Microsoft renews the primary CDN’s certificate, users can optionally choose to reset their source URLs by running another command:

“You can always run fin source reset –force (as administrator) to return to default settings”, advise Adam Langbert, GitHub user.

Before today, the last widespread WinGet disruption occurred in November 2022 due to the CDN returning a “0 byte database file” when queried.