Quote:Every month, dozens of articles appear online that reveal how much the usage of a particular version of Windows has grown or fallen. Most use Steam data and the data that Statcounter provide to back up the claims. Yes, we have reported on this in the past as well.

This month's reporting saw Windows 11 overtake Windows 10 on Steam. Not by a large margin, but it is closing in on the 50% mark was it is powering 49,17% of all devices that use Steam according to the stats.  Steam sees Windwos 10 at 47,09%, which is not that far behind.

Things do not look that great when you check the stats that Statcounter provides. There, Windows 10 dominates the Windows space. It sits at 64.15%, more than double Windows 11's 31.61%. Still the trend is that Windows 10 is falling while Windows 11 is rising.

How surprising is this developmentWhen you compare stats every month, you will notice that Windows 11 usage is rising. It is best to check the average and not to compare month-on-month changes, as these may show weird fluctuations.

Still, one would expect Windows 11 to rise. It is the newer version of the Windows operating system and most PCs sold today are Windows 11 PCs.

While you can still find Windows 10 PCs if you are looking, the vast majority of PCs are sold with either Windows 11 Home or Windows 11 Pro.

This is the surprise

If one thing is surprising, it is how well Windows is holding up. It launched with mixed reviews back in 2015 and faced a similar situation as Windows 11 back then.

Many Windows users loved Windows 7, which was the dominating version of Windows at the time. There was Windows 8, but Microsoft really messed up the launch of the operating system. Even the release of the -- much better - Windows 8.1 did not change the perception of that version of Windows.

So, Windows 10 faced Windows 7, and it did not grow as quickly as Microsoft had hoped. You may remember the 1 billion devices running Windows 10 claim, which Microsoft dropped when it realized, that it would not make it. Telemetry played a role in this, but not nearly as much as privacy-conscious users would have hoped.

Granted, Windows 10 had the advantage that all devices could be upgraded to the new version. And it was free, even to lure as many users as possible.
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