14 DAY TRIAL // Even though all eyes, including Microsoft’s, are now on Windows 10, people are still moving to Windows 8.1 these days, and adoption is going so well that OS usage charts are expected to suffer a new change very soon.
Windows 8.1 alone, so without the help of Windows 8, is very likely to overtake Windows XP in the global OS rankings by the end of the month, figures provided by market researcher StatCounter seem to indicate.
This month, for example, Windows 8.1 has grown so much that it has reached almost the same market share as Windows XP, but the switch of places is, however, very likely to occur by the end of the month.
At this point, Windows 7 continues to lead the desktop OS world with a market share of 56.03 percent, while Windows XP is second with 11.87 percent. Windows 8.1 is really close with a share of 11.69 percent, while Mac OS X comes next with 8.97 percent.
Microsoft’s modern OS keeps growing
The first months after the release of Windows 8 in October 2012, adoption went really terrible, and the new operating system had to face plenty of criticism coming from beginners and experts alike, all of which were disappointed with the amount of changes that Microsoft implemented in the new OS.
Needless to say, adoption remained really low for the rest of the year, but it now appears to grow at a much faster pace.
The combined market share of Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 points to an overall score of 17.33 percent for Microsoft’s modern operating system, obviously becoming the second most-used desktop platform worldwide just after Windows 7.
Windows 10 launching next year
Microsoft’s modern operating systems are expected to continue their growth in the coming months, especially because the company is now working on a brand new version that could arrive as soon as next year.
Windows 10 is already available in the form of a Technical Preview, that includes some of the features expected to be part of the final product, thus allowing users to have a glimpse into the next Windows operating system a lot earlier.
People close to the matter suggested that Windows 10 would arrive in spring 2015, most likely in April, together with some other new products currently under development, such as Windows Phone 10. Even though Microsoft hasn’t talked too much on this particular release, it appears that the next version of Windows Phone is already in the works right now and could launch in preview form in just a couple of months.
