Author: Ramsharan Shrestha 

Windows service is an application that runs without a user being logged into the system, usually to process some data on the machine that needs no user intervention to work with.  

• A Windows service is a long-running executable that performs specific functions, and which is designed not to require user intervention. 
• It is a background process that runs without user interaction. 

• In contract, is a service that runs on a local machine. 
• It is an exe hosted by the operating system and runs continuously waiting on a request. 
• Windows service was mostly used in background tasks, scheduled tasks. 
• A windows service program can call web service methods. 

Web service is a website that, when contacted, returns XML (typically) in one of several standard formats for the service consumer to process. It is an Internet application programming interfaces (API) that can be accessed over a network, such as the Internet, and executed on a remote system hosting the requested services. 

• It is an HTTP interface to a system. For example: The Dynamic CRM API, Twitter API and Google Maps API are REST web services. 
• It is software system used for machine to machine communication over a network. 
• It is hosted by a web server and run as a web application and can be spun up upon request. 

• This is mostly used in application integration between systems. 
• Web service program cannot call window service methods. 

Windows service and web service are not comparable. One can’t be substituted for the other. They are fundamentally different. 

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