Windows Terminal Server Licensing Discovery Registry Key

This article identifies the specific Windows Registry paths responsible for storing Remote Desktop Services (RDS) and Terminal Server licensing discovery parameters. It outlines the exact registry keys within the Windows Registry Editor (Regedit), defines the critical values used for locating license servers, and explains how to configure these settings directly.

Primary Registry Key for License Server Parameters

In Windows Server, the core configuration parameters for Terminal Server licensing discovery and manually specified license servers are stored under:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\TermService\Parameters\LicenseServers

Under this key, individual subkeys represent the hostnames or IP addresses of the licensing servers discovered or assigned to the Terminal Server.

Group Policy-Managed Registry Path

When licensing parameters and discovery settings are managed or overridden by Group Policy, Windows stores the configuration in the following registry path:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows NT\Terminal Services

Within this key, the following values control discovery and licensing behavior:

• LicenseServers (REG_SZ or REG_MULTI_SZ): Contains the list of specific license servers that the Terminal Server communicates with.
• LicensingMode (REG_DWORD): Defines the licensing model applied to the server:
  • 2 = Per Device mode
  • 4 = Per User mode

How to View and Edit the Configuration in Regedit

1. Press Win + R, type regedit, and press Enter to launch the Registry Editor.

2. Navigate to:

   HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows NT\Terminal Services

3. To manually configure a license server, create or modify the string value (REG_SZ) named LicenseServers and enter the Fully Qualified Domain Name (FQDN) or IP address of the target license server.

4. Restart the Remote Desktop Services service (TermService) or reboot the server for the changes to take effect.