Cmd.exe

Command Prompt (cmd.exe)
Other namesWindows Command Processor
Developer(s)Microsoft, IBM, ReactOS contributors
Initial releaseDecember 1987 (1987-12)
Operating system
PlatformIA-32, x86-64, ARM (and historically DEC Alpha, MIPS, PowerPC, and Itanium)
PredecessorCOMMAND.COM
TypeCommand-line interpreter

cmd.exe, a.k.a. Command Prompt, is a shell program on later versions of Windows (NT and CE families), OS/2,, eComStation, ArcaOS, and ReactOS. In some versions of Windows (CE .NET 4.2, CE 5.0 and Embedded CE 6.0) it is referred to as the Command Processor Shell. Implementation differs between operating systems, but with significant consistency of behavior and available commands.

Older, related operating systems, DOS and Windows 9x, provided COMMAND.COM as the shell. cmd.exe replaced COMMAND.COM in the Windows product line with the introduction of NT. Current versions of Windows include PowerShell as an alternative shell that runs side-by-side with cmd.exe.

The initial version of cmd.exe for Windows NT was developed by Therese Stowell. Windows CE 2.11 was the first embedded Windows release to support a console and a Windows CE version of cmd.exe. The ReactOS implementation of cmd.exe is derived from FreeCOM, the FreeDOS command line interpreter.