Windows 10 has finally surpassed Windows 7 in terms of users. Officially released back in 2015, the latest version of Windows now has more users than Windows 7. According to a report by Net Market Share, Windows 10 has now captured a user base of 39.22 percent, beating Windows 7’s user base of 36.90 percent.
Hence, Windows 10 becomes the most popular OS in the world, way ahead of macOS X which has userbase of 9.61 percent, followed by Windows XP and Windows 8.1.
Microsoft originally hoped to achieve over one billion Windows 10 devices in a span of three years, though that did not happen. The company announced back in May last year that nearly 700 million PCs are running Windows 10. It’s also worth noting that Windows 10 growth was impacted ever since the end of the free upgrade offer for Windows 7 and Windows 8 users.
The latest version of Windows did see an increase market share, though at a much slower pace, as more and more businesses moved away from Windows 7. With that being said, one can’t deny the fact that Windows 10 adoption accelerated throughout 2017-18.
Users still running older versions of Windows
That said, the majority of users are still running older versions of the OS even now. Extended support for Windows 7 will come to end in 2020, and by that time Microsoft should be able to achieve that 1 billion target.
During the initial launch of the OS, Microsoft said it won’t have much trouble getting users to upgrade to newer versions of Windows in the near future. The company’s Windows as a Service strategy has performed rather well so far, with more than 20 percent of all Windows 10 users already using the latest feature update for the OS, which rolled out in October.
Not to mention, Microsoft has a huge year ahead of itself with one major update planned for the first half of 2019, while another in the second half of 2019.
