Classic TYPO3 installation using symlinks on a Windows server

While it is possible to run TYPO3 on Windows, you might encounter Windows- specific limitations or issues.

If you have the choice, we recommend using a LAMP stack (Linux, Apache, MySQL or MariaDB, and PHP). You can then install TYPO3 using Composer (recommended) or in classic mode.

For local development on Windows PCs, we recommend using WSL2 or running Linux-based environments using Docker.

Download and extract the TYPO3 package using zip

Download the TYPO3 source package from https://get.typo3.org/ and extract the .zip file on your server.

Ensure that the package is placed one level above the web server's document root.

Create the required symlinks using mklink

Use the Windows command shell (cmd.exe) with administrator rights to create the following symlinks in your document root:

C:pathtoyoursite\

mklink /d typo3_src ..\typo3_src-13.4.y
mklink /d typo3 typo3_src\typo3
mklink index.php typo3_src\index.php

Note

On Windows, mklink requires administrator rights.

Important

Make sure to include the entire TYPO3 source directory, including the vendor directory. Missing this directory will result in missing dependencies.

Expected directory structure on Windows

After creating the symlinks, your directory structure should look like this:

:path:`typo3_src-13.4.y`
public` * :path:typo3_src -> ..typo3_src-13.4.y` :path:`typo3 -> typo3_src\\typo3\\` index.php -> typo3_src\index.php

Run the installation wizard and complete the installation

In the next steps, you will use the installation wizard to:

Connect TYPO3 to your database
Create required folders
Create an administrator user
Choose or create a site package (theme)