NTDEV Releases Nano11 Builder (2025) – The Lightest Version of Windows 11 Yet

NTDEV, the developer behind the popular Tiny11 project, has just released Nano11 Builder — a new PowerShell-based tool that trims Windows 11 down to its bare bones. Unlike Tiny11, which already offered a lightweight alternative to Microsoft’s full operating system, Nano11 takes the pruning process to an entirely new level.

The result? A Windows 11 ISO up to 3.5x smaller than the official version from Microsoft.

How Much Smaller Can Windows 11 Get?

In NTDEV’s demo, a standard Windows 11 ISO weighed in at 7.04GB. After processing with Nano11 Builder, the ISO size dropped to just 2.29GB.

And it doesn’t stop there:

• Using the Windows 11 LTSC ISO as a source, NTDEV managed to achieve an installed footprint of only 2.8GB.
• A regular Nano11 install starts around 11GB on disk, but by applying the Compact command with LZX compression and removing the pagefile, the footprint can be squeezed down to around 3.2GB.

This kind of reduction makes Nano11 especially appealing for virtual machines and quick test environments.

What Gets Removed in Nano11

Nano11 Builder isn’t just about shaving gigabytes — it’s about creating a bare-minimum Windows 11 environment. According to NTDEV, the script removes:

• Windows Hello packages
• Unnecessary drivers
• .NET precompiled assemblies
• Input Method Editor (IME) components
• Wallpapers and visual extras
• Other “fluff” not essential for testing

The result is a stripped-down Windows 11 installation with a minimal Start Menu and almost no extras.

Installation and Testing in a VM

In NTDEV’s video walkthrough, the Nano11-processed ISO is installed inside VMware Workstation on a 20GB virtual disk. While the installation runs quickly, the real appeal is in seeing how small the final setup can become.

This makes Nano11 an excellent option for developers and testers who want a lightweight Windows 11 sandbox without the overhead of a full OS.

Not for Daily Use — A Word of Caution

NTDEV is clear: Nano11 Builder is an experimental script. It’s described as a way to create a “quick and dirty development testbed” — not a stable or supported version of Windows for daily work.

If you’re looking for a practical, minimal Windows 11 build to run on older hardware, Tiny11 is still the safer option. Nano11, by contrast, is more of a proof-of-concept for extreme OS trimming.

Conclusion

With Nano11, NTDEV has shown just how far Windows 11 can be compressed while still functioning. Shrinking the OS down to as little as 2.8GB highlights both the flexibility of Microsoft’s platform and the ingenuity of the Windows tinkering community.

While it’s not intended for mainstream use, Nano11 serves as a fascinating experiment for testers, VM users, and anyone curious about how lean Windows can get.