[windows-2025-vs2026] Missing v143 UWP C++ tools (x86/x64) — Microsoft.VisualStudio.ComponentGroup.UWP.VC

[pacovidal]

2026-05-14 update. Per @Pierreluc14's clarification below ("On windows-2025-vs2026 only PlatformToolset v145 is installed"), this report's framing was incorrect. VS 2026 doesn't ship the v143 toolset at all (only v145). The original repro uses PlatformToolset=v143, which fails on VS 2026 because v143 is absent — not because the v143 UWP overlay specifically is missing. The right answer for VS-2026-only environments is to migrate the project to PlatformToolset=v145 (VS 2026's default toolset). I've removed the suggested workaround / fix below to avoid misleading anyone; treat this issue as closed unless someone has a concrete v143 use case that still needs runner support. Apologies for the noise.

Original report

Building any C++ project on the windows-2025-vs2026 image that targets <ApplicationType>Windows Store</ApplicationType> with PlatformToolset=v143 fails at PrepareForBuild with:

error MSB8020: The build tools for 'v143' application Type UWP
(Platform Toolset = 'Visual Studio 2022') cannot be found.

I had originally diagnosed this as the v143 UWP x86/x64 overlay being missing while v143 UWP for ARM64/ARM64EC and v142 UWP were present. That observation is correct, but the conclusion is wrong: VS 2026's v180 schema uses v145, not v143. v143 (and its UWP overlays for x86/x64) is intentionally not on this image. Trying to add Microsoft.VisualStudio.ComponentGroup.UWP.VC.v143 via setup.exe modify --quiet exits 0 but installs nothing, presumably for the same reason.

Repro (kept for reference)

A minimal .vcxproj with these properties triggers MSB8020 on windows-2025-vs2026:

<PropertyGroup Label="Globals">
  <ApplicationType>Windows Store</ApplicationType>
  <ApplicationTypeRevision>10.0</ApplicationTypeRevision>
  <WindowsTargetPlatformVersion>10.0.26100.0</WindowsTargetPlatformVersion>
  <Platform>x64</Platform>
</PropertyGroup>
<PropertyGroup Label="Configuration">
  <ConfigurationType>StaticLibrary</ConfigurationType>
  <PlatformToolset>v143</PlatformToolset>
</PropertyGroup>

The same project builds cleanly on windows-2025 (VS 2022) because v143 is the native toolset there.

What to do if you hit this

Switch your project's PlatformToolset to v145 (VS 2026's native toolset). No image changes required.

[pacovidal]

Thanks @Pierreluc14 - that explains the behaviour I was seeing. I've edited the issue body to remove the misleading workaround and clarified that the right action is to switch to PlatformToolset=v145 rather than expecting v143 on the VS 2026 image. Feel free to close this.

[v-SergeiRadich]

As it was already pointed, VS2026 is 29.4.3 with platformToolset v145, so correct solution here would be to update the project files.

Since no actions from Runner Images team are needed here, I'm closing the issue.