NFS Versions

The NFS client implements both versions 2 and 3 of the NFS protocol. Version 2 is by far the most widely supported version of NFS. Version 3 features many improvements particularly in performance. To an end-user or application developer the version of NFS that is being used is unimportant, the NFS client negotiates the NFS version automatically with the server. Because version 3 has many performance improvements the client will exercise a preference for that version of the protocol. It will use version 2 only if the server does not support version 3.