How to move WSL2 distro

Edit -

As pointed out by lxrunoffline author, it is supported to move WSL2 distro. No conversion needed. This post is applicable for older lxrunoffline versions. If you are on latest version follow this post - /blog/install-move-wsl-distro-from-c-drive-to-another-drive/

You can use LxRunOffline tool to move WSL 1 distros. I faced errors for moving wsl2 distro. You need to convert your distro to v1 and then move. Then convert again to v2.

Move WSL2 distro from C drive

• Install LxRunOffline tool. choco install lxrunoffline

- Stop your distro.

wsl --list --verbose List all the installed distros on your system. I get output like this.

D:\work>wsl --list --verbose
NAME STATE VERSION
docker-desktop Stopped 2
Ubuntu-18.04 Stopped 2
docker-desktop-data Stopped 2
D:\work>

• wsl --set-version Ubuntu-18.04 1 This will convert your distro from v2 to v1.
• lxrunoffline move -n Ubuntu-18.04 -d G:\wsl\. Move your distro to another drive. My distro name here is Ubuntu-18.04. I am moving it to G drive and wsl folder inside it. It would take some time to finish moving.
• wsl --set-version Ubuntu-18.04 2 This will convert your distro from v1 to v2 again.

That's it. You can start to use your distro again.

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