At the 14. January 2020 the extended mainstream support for Windows 7 expired, more than ten years after the appearance of this operating system. This means that there are no more security or feature updates for private users. Nevertheless, it is still very popular almost a year later, as a look at the evaluation of the Statcounter shows.

Windows 7 was still running in December on about 18 Percentage of the Windows PCs recorded by Statcounter.

(Image: GlobalStats Statcounter)

Therefore run on scarce 76 Percentage of counted Windows computers Windows 10, Windows 7 is around 18 percent in second place. This is somewhat surprising, especially since Microsoft is still offering the upgrade to Windows 10 free of charge although the company is no longer promoting it publicly. On the other hand, the latest Windows edition has a bad reputation with some users, for example because it collects data in the background and strongly urges them to create a Microsoft account.

Windows 8 and 8.1 come together, according to Statcounter about 5 percent, while Windows XP only runs on 0.8 percent of the recorded devices. Only Windows Vista is even rarer with 0.4 percent.

The United States Government Digital Analytics Program, which evaluates visits to US websites, offers a different perspective on these figures. One of the possible filters is the version of Windows used. Accordingly, 14, 9 percent of surfers used Windows 7 and 75, 8 percent Windows 10. Based on Microsoft’s statement that around 1.5 billion users use Windows, this means that at least 100 millions of them are still on Windows 7.

Players like Windows 10 According to the evaluation of the Steam gaming platform, the distribution is a little different: While almost 96 Percentage of users playing under Windows, comes Windows 10 on a user share of 88, 6 percent. Windows 7, however, only accounts for 5.4 percent. This is probably due to the fact that Microsoft DirectX 12 initially only for Windows 10. Only in March 2019 followed DirectX 12 for Windows 7.

According to the Steam Survey, only just under 6 percent of users still play under Windows 7.

(Image: Steam Survey)

According to Steam, the share of the other Windows versions together is not even 1.7 percent – more than Linux (0.9 percent), but only about half as much as macOS (3rd , 37 percent).

Not yet dead in the company In the private environment, it mainly depends on personal preferences whether you want to use Windows 10, it looks different in corporate use. Some company authorities or universities are forced to continue to use an old Windows version due to compatibility requirements.

Offers Microsoft is still offering the so-called Extended Security Updates (ESU) for Windows 7 up to 2023. However, this can be quite expensive, because the ESUs are calculated per Windows computer and the prices double every year. From January 2021 Microsoft requires for a system with Windows 7 Enterprise 50 U.S. dollar; Windows 7 Pro costs an annual 100 dollar support fee. The steadily rising costs are likely to ensure that other major customers say goodbye to Windows 7. (bkr)