14 DAY TRIAL // Windows 7 might not be exactly breathing down Windows XP’s neck, but I cannot help but wonder how different will the operating system market look in early 2012. This because Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Steve Ballmer recently forecasted sales of 350 million Windows 7 PCs in 2011 alone.
350 million Windows 7 licenses have already been shipped worldwide, since the operating system was launched in 2009.
Overall, counting from Windows 7’s general availability deadline, the volume of Windows computers sold globally exceeds 500 million.
May 2011 brought with it more erosion of Windows XP’s dominance over the operating system market, in favor of Windows 7, according to Net Applications.
XP’s usage share dropped from 53.18% in April to just 52.41% last month. Of course, XP’s downward trajectory is nothing new, so it’s no actual surprise that the OS lost even more usage share last month.
Meanwhile, Windows 7 is doing a great job at picking up the audience lost by XP. Windows 7’s usage share increased yet again in the past couple of months, from 25.11% to 25.89%.
It's easy to see that Windows 7’s usage share has climbed to over half that of XP’s, with the trend expected to continue over the next few months.
Windows Vista hit a new mark in May, dropping under 10% usage share to just 9.93% from 10.22% the month before. But I’ve yet to hear a single customer complain about Vista’s rather rapid disappearance from the OS stage.
And what Vista was incapable of doing, Windows 7 might actually manage to get accomplished, perhaps even sooner than anybody expects.
If my math is correct, sales of Windows 7 should shoot past the 650 million licenses by early 2012. At such a point in time it’s hard to believe that the platform won’t be crowned the new king of the OS market.