Microsoft Unveils Hardware-Accelerated BitLocker to Enhance Performance and Security

Microsoft announced hardware-accelerated BitLocker shipping with Windows 11 24H2/25H2 that offloads encryption to SoC crypto engines and uses hardware-wrapped keys with XTS-AES-256 by default, restoring NVMe performance close to unencrypted levels and reducing CPU cycles by roughly 70%; administrators can verify the mode with `manage-bde -status`, but certain policy-specified algorithms or key sizes may prevent hardware acceleration, and initial support is available on Intel vPro Core Ultra Series 3 devices.