NTFS (New Technology File System) is the standard file system of Windows NT, including Windows 2000, Windows XP, and all their successors to date. NTFS supersedes the FAT file system as the preferred file system for Microsoft's Windows operating systems. NTFS has several improvements over FAT and HPFS (High Performance File System), such as improved support for metadata, and the use of advanced data structures to improve performance, reliability, and disk space utilization, plus additional extensions, such as security access control lists (ACL) and file system journaling.