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Remote Desktop Services (RDS) is the Windows Server platform for delivering session-based desktops and published applications: many users sharing sessions on server-hosted Windows, all connecting over RDP. It is a Microsoft on-premises and hybrid technology, and it has nothing to do with Amazon RDS, AWS's Relational Database Service, beyond the unfortunate shared acronym.
RDS hosts multiple independent user sessions on one shared Windows Server, each isolated from the others.
In the Microsoft world, RDS means Remote Desktop Services, formerly called Terminal Services until Windows Server 2008 R2 renamed it. Search results will mix in the unrelated Amazon database service, a radio standard, and a couple of retail brands along the way. This page covers Microsoft RDS only.
A deployment is really a set of Windows Server roles cooperating with each other. RD Session Host runs the user sessions, desktops and RemoteApp programs both. RD Connection Broker routes each incoming user to the right host and reconnects any disconnected session. RD Web Access publishes the available desktops and apps through a browser portal and feed. RD Gateway carries external connections over HTTPS so the session hosts are never directly exposed. RD Licensing issues and tracks the CALs users and devices consume. Small deployments collapse several of these onto one server. Production deployments keep them separate.
An RDS farm is just a group of RD Session Host servers publishing the same desktops or applications as one logical collection. The Connection Broker distributes new logons across the farm, by session count or by configured weights, and reconnects users to their existing sessions no matter which host those sessions live on. Farms are how RDS scales past one server and how it survives maintenance: drain a host, patch it, put it back in rotation, nobody notices. Sizing, collection design, and load-balancing mechanics get into real architecture territory, but the ideas worth holding onto are shared load, session reconnection, and horizontal scale.
An RDS estate concentrates users, credentials, and data all in one place, so it inherits every RDP risk at multiplied stakes. The essentials do not change: never expose session hosts' 3389 directly, use Gateway or brokered access instead, require MFA in front of every session, keep hosts patched, scope collections per user group, and actually monitor logons rather than just logging them. The complete treatment lives at RDP Security → and in the how-to article.
On top of Windows Server licensing, every connecting user or device needs an RDS CAL, tracked by the RD Licensing role. User vs Device CALs, version compatibility, and cost considerations get the full treatment on the RDS CAL page →
No. Amazon RDS is a managed database service. Identical acronym, completely unrelated products.
Any Windows Server holding one or more RDS roles, most commonly an RD Session Host.
RDP is the protocol. RDS is the platform built on top of it. Full comparison: RDP vs RDS →
Yes. It ships with current Windows Server and remains widely deployed, alongside cloud alternatives such as AVD.
Where TruGrid fits. TruGrid SecureRDP modernizes RDS access with MFA-verified sessions to your existing farms, without ever exposing Gateway or the hosts themselves to the internet. See the RDS modernization approach →
TruGrid SecureRDP delivers Zero Trust remote desktop access: MFA, least privilege, and zero open inbound ports.
Explore SecureRDP →
TruGrid simplifies Access and Device Security for organizations by reducing complexity and associated costs.
