Windows 11 usage share continues to rise slowly
Microsoft's Windows 11 operating system continued its slow but steady usage share climb in December 2022. Microsoft released the operating system in late 2021 to the public. Since then, it has gained in usage share, as was expected.
The release of the first stable version or the first official feature update did not give it a catapult start or boost, however. When you look at Statcounter's numbers for the desktop Windows operating system market share worldwide, you will see that Windows 11 gained 0.84% compared to November 2022. Windows 10, the dominating Windows operating system, lost 1.8% in December 2022. It is still on more than 67% of all Windows devices. Windows 11's has a share of less than 17% according to Statcounter, just 6% more than Windows 7, which is being retired this month.
Over on Steam, Windows 11 managed to gain 0.44% over the previous month. Windows 10 dropped by just 0.18% and Windows 7 dropped by 0.22%. Not a lot of movement in the month. Windows 11's overall usage share is a bit better on Steam; it sits at 28.42% in December 2022, still trailing Windows 10's 65.42%. Windows 7 is not doing nearly as well on Steam, as it is listed with a usage share of just 1.77% in December 2022.
Both services provide a snapshot of part of the Windows population. Statcounter tracks hits on a large number of Internet sites, and Steam only gamer systems. Gamers have a tendency towards better hardware, as games can be demanding. New PCs do come with new versions of Windows often, and that may explain why Windows 11 is doing better on Steam than on other stats tracking services.
As far as predictions for 2023 are concerned; Windows 11 will continue its slow rise throughout the year. It will benefit from Windows 7's and 8.1's end of support in January 2023, but that won't be enough to close the gap to Windows 10 significantly.
On Statcounter, Windows 11 will likely break the 20%, maybe even the 25% mark at the end of 2023. On Steam, it may reach 35% but there is little doubt that Windows 10 will remain the dominating version of Windows in 2023. Even Windows 7 will continue to play a role in the statistics in 2023.
It will be interesting to see whether Windows 11 manages to surpass Windows 10 as the most popular Windows version by 2025. Windows 10 reaches end of support at the end of that year.
Now You: what are your predictions for Windows 11?
It boggles the mind to know so many people are still using Wind0wz and think they can outsmart the telemetry with various programs, host file entries, and more.
At some point, when you go so far to protect yourself from your own OS, you should think, “Gee, maybe I should try Linux because this shit is fucked!” Nope, they believe in their puny minds they have eliminated all privacy/security threats in Wind0wz 10/11.
Because of the decline in the Windows 7 numbers, the number of Windows 11 will keep on rising.
But in 2025 probably the numbers for Windows 11 will be the same as the number from Windows 10.
But there is a new player on the market and it’s called Windows 12.
Many Windows 10 users are looking for the leap (to) version (Windows 12) specifics and when it’s not as unstable as Windows 11 (Even after more than a year it’s unbelievable) then they will cross over.
For me personally, Windows 11 convicted me that I have to keep on working to migrate completely to Raspberry pi and Linux.
After using Windows 11 for almost a year, I got tired of all the issues I was running into. I decided to do a fresh install of Windows 10 and my God it is night/day difference. I should’ve stayed on 10 all along!
I’m trying out Windows 12 a friend uploaded to a server.. I don’t see any apps. It has crashed on me about 8 times so far. Dell Optiplex 7010
Considering all the bugs I have run into with Windows 11 I am surprised Windows 10 didn’t have an increase. I guess lazy users will just deal with the crashes. I have one machine that still blue screens a couple times a week and random times. Before I updated the bios and drivers it would blue screen up to 2 times per hour. And this was a brand new HP all-in-one. No additional hardware beyond what it shipped with.
Don’t watch, excise the tumour!
It’s a miracle that W11 increase users.
The only way it does is because of preloads. The Microsoft tax on every PC.
@Anonymous +1
Most people prefer Windows 10 but Microsoft forces Windows 11 on every new purchased device. Users are stuck using this awful alpha quality OS.
“As far as predictions for 2023 are concerned; Windows 11 will continue its slow rise throughout the year. It will benefit from Windows 7’s and 8.1’s end of support in January 2023,”
No, it won’t.
Windows 7 and 8.1 PCs are not Windows 11 compatible. Windows 10 may gain from Windows 7’s and 8.1’s end of support.
Also the people that use Windows 7 to this day are most likely doing it willingly and they won’t abandon the cause just because of end of support. From what I know, there was some 3rd party service that provided updates after end of support for I think either Windows 7 or Windows XP that are meant for Enterprise but brings them to Pro and Home users just the same. I think Microsoft may announce the end of support, but they will continue to release more security updates for years.
I’m not sure, but I think Windows XP is still getting security updates for a very specific edition/division.
I would switch to Windows 7 in the blink of an eye if my CPU wasn’t 8th generation Intel. I would use Windows 7 until the very end, it was so good that it’s totally worth even now with all the artificial enforced limitations that Microsoft and other companies are imposing on it, like stopping browser updates (when they don’t really have to) and such.
All of this is made to force people to Windows 10 and 11 so that everyone is using the same POS and nobody is using the superior Windows 7.
The only reason why people are forced to switch to Windows 10 from 7 is software compatiliblity AS companies are deprecating Windows 7 from their support, for example Python, .NET Framework 7, those are so important that keeping Windows 7 will harm even your job.