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MME, UMP, Windows MIDI Services. What is this?

MME - Multimedia_Extensions format - the old format to handle MIDI devices since 1983
UMP - Universal MIDI Packet format - the new format to be available in 2025 with Windows MIDI Services

Windows MIDI Services

In 2025 Microsoft will ship a new software package how to handle MIDI devices. This new software package is called 'Windows MIDI Services (WMS)' and is included in Windows 10/11. WMS replaces the old MME or WinMM software package which has been used in Windows since the earl Windows days (the roots go back to ~1983). As of this writing (on 2025/05/13) WMS is included in the Canary pre-version of Windows 11 and will be fully launched in Windows 10/11 in 2025.

More about WMS please see https://microsoft.github.io/MIDI/overview/

WMS will become the default way how to run MIDI devices on Windows.

Since late 2024 we at Notation are directly involved and in contact with Microsoft to incorporate WMS into our products. Many interface proposals, recommendations which we made, and bugs which we found have been incorporate into WMS to smoothly work with our products.

When WMS is going to be fully launched in 2025 the UMP protocol is the default protocol to be used with Notation's products.

There are lots of benefits in the UMP protocol compared to the old legacy MME protocol (from 1983). Today in 5.1.2 the UMP MIDI 1.0 format is implemented. MIDI 2.0 is planned as well.

Our concept for WMS in version 5 is that a smooth transition is managed from the today's world to the new WMS world.

Of course, we offer both formats (MME, UMP) for those interfaces where WMS is not yet available (JACK, macOS on Wine).