Download an executable for Windows
----------------------------------

Pre-compiled Windows installers which install LAMMPS executables on a
Windows system can be downloaded from this site:

.. parsed-literal::

  `http://packages.lammps.org/windows.html <http://packages.lammps.org/windows.html>`_

Note that each installer package has a date in its name, which
corresponds to the LAMMPS version of the same date.  Installers for
current and older versions of LAMMPS are available.  32-bit and 64-bit
installers are available, and each installer contains both a serial
and parallel executable.  The installer website also explains how to
install the Windows MPI package (MPICH2 from Argonne National Labs),
needed to run in parallel with MPI.

The LAMMPS binaries contain *all* :doc:`optional packages <Packages>`
included in the source distribution except: KIM, KOKKOS, MSCG, PYTHON,
ADIOS, H5MD, NETCDF, QMMM, ML-QUIP, and VTK.
The serial version also does not include the MPIIO and
LATBOLTZ packages.  The GPU package is compiled for OpenCL with
mixed precision kernels.

The LAMMPS library is compiled as a shared library and the
:doc:`LAMMPS Python module <Python_module>` is installed, so that
it is possible to load LAMMPS into a Python interpreter.

The installer site also has instructions on how to run LAMMPS under
Windows, once it is installed, in both serial and parallel.

When you download the installer package, you run it on your Windows
machine.  It will then prompt you with a dialog, where you can choose
the installation directory, unpack and copy several executables,
potential files, documentation pdfs, selected example files, etc.  It
will then update a few system settings (e.g. PATH, LAMMPS_POTENTIALS)
and add an entry into the Start Menu (with references to the
documentation, LAMMPS homepage and more).  From that menu, there is
also a link to an uninstaller that removes the files and undoes the
environment manipulations.

Note that to update to a newer version of LAMMPS, you should typically
uninstall the version you currently have, download a new installer,
and go through the install procedure described above.  I.e. the same
procedure for installing/updating most Windows programs.  You can
install multiple versions of LAMMPS (in different directories), but
only the executable for the last-installed package will be found
automatically, so this should only be done for debugging purposes.

