Wolves came out on top in a game of two penalties to climb out of the relegation zone and leave Nottingham Forest bottom of the Premier League.
Skipper Ruben Neves drove the hosts in front from the spot after a four-minute video assistant referee delay at the start of the second half.
After a second lengthy VAR intervention when referee Thomas Bramall initially missed Matheus Nunes pulling back Ryan Yates, Wolves keeper Jose Sa superbly turned away Brennan Johnson's spot-kick.
The save was made more remarkable as Sa has been playing with a broken bone in his wrist since he damaged it against Fulham on 13 August.
Max Kilman earlier hit the inside of a post with a first-half header and was unfortunate the rebound went straight to Forest keeper Dean Henderson.
It was a superb way for interim Wolves bosses Steve Davis and James Collins to start a potentially crucial week that ends with a home game against Leicester next Sunday.
However, the pain goes on for Forest boss Steve Cooper. His side are without a win since August and have picked up a single point from their past seven games.
He later said, "When you lose it's always hard to take. I know we've had the penalty but we've not looked after the ball well enough. Wolves are a technical team and we were happy to be in our mid block. When we got the ball we didn't show enough bravery, we didn't show enough technique.
"Less said about the referee's performance today the better. I'm pretty sure there would've been a different decision if it was at the other end.
"We'll always look at ourselves first and first half I didn't think we did well enough with the ball.
"It's not about going back to the drawing board, it's about continuing the process of trying to become who we want to be regardless of results."