Windows 11 market share still not achieving goals provided by Microsoft, while Windows 10 is still the ‘king’ of computer desktopsaccording to data from Statcounter.
The monthly report published by the analytics firm says that Windows 11 gained 1.83 percentage points in October 2022, going from 13.61% to 15.44%. A good monthly increase, surely motivated by the launch of the new version 22H2, but insufficient to achieve a usage quota that we can consider important for the latest Windows released.
By contrast, Windows 10 remains in an unreachable area (for now) with a share of 71.29%. Windows 7 still has 9.61%, a huge share for an operating system that long ago lost its official support and that has its maximum expression in companies, where it is more used than Windows 11 according to data from the firm Lansweeper. The rest of Windows users are divided between Windows 8.1 (2.51%), Windows 8 (0.69%) and Windows XP still alive with 0.39%.
The above data shows that the Windows ecosystem has the 75.93% of the world market for desktop operating systems, a significant cut since the beginning of 2022. Here we must mention the rise in the sale of Mac computers and with it the macOS share up to 15.74%.
For its part, Linux still does not occupy the share that its quality, freedom and gratuity deserve and remains at 2.6%. That yes, it would be necessary to add the 2.38% of Chrome OS that Statcounter assigns to it before the Linux base used by the Google system. And we always talk about computer desktops because if we have mobile devices, the film changes completely and another Linux like Android rules the global world.
The Statcounter data differs significantly from others such as AdDuplex, which assigns more than 23% to Windows 11. It is more or less the share that the latest Steam survey shows us and that, like the previous ones, helps us to assess trends, since Microsoft does not provide official numbers about its system and therefore exact values remain unknown.
The difference in results is explained by the different methods of data collection. AdDuplex obtains its statistics from the applications that use its SDK (only 5,000), while Steam’s is faithful, but it only refers to its own clients, PC players to be exact. Compared to them, Statcounter’s reports are more ‘open’ as they are based on information collected from more than 1.5 million websites.
Why won’t the Windows 11 quota go up?
The analysis of the data and the general assessment of analysts and users is -in general- quite clear: Windows 11 has not fallen in love with Windows users and only a small part has migrated from previous versions. 15% is too little. And that can add up the pre-installations on new computers that are all delivered with Windows 11.
The causes are known and stem from the increase in minimum hardware requirements and the chaotic management of the same, with changes of course in just weeks from Microsoft itself. To this are added the errors in the updates, which continue to happen in each update and the unfulfilled promises in features that have not yet arrived.
In addition, although it offers a breath of fresh air in visual aspects and user interface and it must be appreciated that it supports a good part of the legacy of the gigantic Windows ecosystem, it is still essentially a ‘tuned’ Windows 10. Windows 10 is also “guilty” of the low market share of Windows 11. It is becoming more stable and will have official support until 2025.
There is time to migrate to Windows 11. Or better yet, wait for a Windows 12 that is already under development at Redmond headquarters.
