Windows 7: A year after the end-of-support deadline, millions choose not to upgrade

[aum]

Microsoft officially ended support for its one-time flagship operating system, Windows 7, at the start of 2020. As the year draws to a close, I ran the numbers to see how many PCs are still running this unsupported OS. Spoiler: It's a big number[.]

 

With a heartfelt nod to Monty Python, Windows 7 would like you all to know that it's not dead yet.

 

 

A year after Microsoft officially ended support for its long-running OS, a small but determined population of PC users would rather fight than switch. How many? No one knows for sure, but that number has shrunk substantially in the past year.

 

On the eve of Microsoft's Windows 7 end-of-support milestone, I consulted some analytics experts and calculated that the owners of roughly 200 million PCs worldwide would ignore that deadline and continue running their preferred OS. That was, admittedly, a rough estimate. (If you want to do the math yourself, read my year-ago post, "It's 2020: How many PCs are still running Windows 7?")

 

During the holiday lull at the end of 2020, I decided to go back and run the latest version of those analytics reports. They tell a consistent story.

 

Let's start with the United States Government Digital Analytics Program, which reports a running, unfiltered total of visitors to U.S. websites over the previous 90 days. One of the datasets includes a report of visits from all PCs running any version of Windows, which makes it an ideal proxy for this question.

 

At the end of December 2019, 75.8% of those PCs were running Windows 10, 18.9% were still on Windows 7, and a mere 4.6% were sticking with the unloved Windows 8.x.

 

A year later, as December 2020 draws to a close, the proportion of PCs running Windows 10 has gone up 12%, to 87.8%; the Windows 7 count has dropped by more than 10 points, to 8.5%, and the population of Windows 8.x holdouts has shrunk even further, to a minuscule 3.4%. (The onetime champion of PC operating systems, Windows XP, is now nearly invisible, with its device count adding up to a fraction of a rounding error.)

 

If my calculations a year ago were on the mark, that means more than 100 million Windows PC were retired, recycled, or upgraded in the past 12 months.

 

Other metrics tell a nearly identical story.

 

At NetMarketShare, for example, the numbers at the end of 2020 show Windows 10 usage up 11 points, from 63.0% to 74.0%, while Windows 9 usage dropped 9.5 points, from 31.2% to 21.7%.

 

Likewise, StatCounter Global Stats showed the number of PCs running Windows 10 increased more than 12 percent, from 64.7% to 76.0%, while the Windows 7 PC population dropped nearly 10 points to 17.7%.

 

Turning those percentages into whole numbers isn't a matter of simple division, unfortunately, because we don't know the denominator. Microsoft has told us for years that the Windows user base is 1.5 billion, but I argued a year ago that the number of Windows PCs is probably much lower than that, even with a pandemic-induced resurgence in PC sales. Even allowing for that uncertainty, it's clear that at least 100 million PCs are still running Windows 7, and that number could be significantly higher.

 

Some of those holdouts are paying Microsoft for the privilege of receiving security updates, although it's not clear how many are part of the Extended Security Update program. And those customers will face more pressure to upgrade in 2021 as the cost of those updates is set to double.

 

Source

[Sylence]

Not everyone is smart  if they were, the world wouldn't be the way it is now.

let them stay on Windows 7 and get malware, if they don't care about themselves, why should others care.

 

[banned]

If I can still use Windows XP without getting malware, surely Windows 7 users can figure it out...

 

Windows 7 even gets security updates...

[Sylence]

2 hours ago, banned said:

If I can still use Windows XP without getting malware, surely Windows 7 users can figure it out...

 

Windows 7 even gets security updates...

 

not for regular customers, only enterprises that pay for it each year and it's not forever.

 

security updates in Windows update are more important than you think.

[funkyy]

I'll use my Windows 7 (x64) until I decide to change to Windows 10.

Right now I manually download and install the Security updates for

my system each month, I have good anti-virus and anti-malware

programs installed, I surf with care and I don't get tempted to click

unusual items. I also make regular full image backups of my computer.

So all that plus the Security updates has kept me quite content.

[cyberloner]

a lot software going to expire win 7 in future.... just remember buy cheap ssd to install win 10

suggest win 10 ltsc.....  plain and lite..

[straycat19]

16 hours ago, Sylence said:

not for regular customers, only enterprises that pay for it each year and it's not forever.

Not true.  I'm a regular user (I have 53 home computers so some people think I'm not regular) and I get the security update every month.  I just go to Microsoft's Catalog and download it.  I put it on one of my NAS units and then can update any of the 50 Windows 7 computers at any time.  The other 3 computers are 1 x Win 8.1 and 2 x Win 10.  Over half of my computers are diskless now using Corsair Flash Voyager GTX drives up to  1TB so I can run anything on them, and do.  I have various releases of Linux including Kali, various Windows, forensic software, etc on the drives. Do I worry about malware? No, not since I stopped using any type of antivirus or anti malware software about 7 years ago and started taking responsibility for my own security.  How do I know I can?  Because I download  several GB a month of malware files and test them against some of my systems. So far not one piece of malware will run on any of my Windows 7 systems.  Microsoft could have written the story of Chicken Little or War of the Worlds as scared as they made people of Windows 7.  And what did upgraders get?  Just the opportunity to screw up their systems by being beta testers for Microsoft Windows 10 which is neither stable, safe, nor secure.

[MrZeb]

57 minutes ago, straycat19 said:

Not true.  I'm a regular user (I have 53 home computers so some people think I'm not regular) and I get the security update every month.  I just go to Microsoft's Catalog and download it.  I put it on one of my NAS units and then can update any of the 50 Windows 7 computers at any time.

 

Unless you have a patched Windows 7 to accept the updates released after January 2020 this will not work, I tested this!

 

[Sylence]

2 hours ago, straycat19 said:

Not true.  I'm a regular user (I have 53 home computers so some people think I'm not regular) and I get the security update every month.  I just go to Microsoft's Catalog and download it.  I put it on one of my NAS units and then can update any of the 50 Windows 7 computers at any time.  The other 3 computers are 1 x Win 8.1 and 2 x Win 10.  Over half of my computers are diskless now using Corsair Flash Voyager GTX drives up to  1TB so I can run anything on them, and do.  I have various releases of Linux including Kali, various Windows, forensic software, etc on the drives. Do I worry about malware? No, not since I stopped using any type of antivirus or anti malware software about 7 years ago and started taking responsibility for my own security.  How do I know I can?  Because I download  several GB a month of malware files and test them against some of my systems. So far not one piece of malware will run on any of my Windows 7 systems.  Microsoft could have written the story of Chicken Little or War of the Worlds as scared as they made people of Windows 7.  And what did upgraders get?  Just the opportunity to screw up their systems by being beta testers for Microsoft Windows 10 which is neither stable, safe, nor secure.

 

Not true? are you sure?

what's the source for your updates? link?

 

 

2 hours ago, MrZeb said:

 

Unless you have a patched Windows 7 to accept the updates released after January 2020 this will not work, I tested this!

 

 

 

Exactly.

 

@straycat19 look at that.

[UberGeek]

Quote

With a heartfelt nod to Monty Python, Windows 7 would like you all to know that it's not dead yet.

Hey, wait a minute . . . isn't that EXACTLY what Windows XP had also hollered from under its tombstone?

[nIGHT]

I have one laptop that has no AV, just windows default firewall, updated the security patches just once in 2014, on for almost 24 hours 365 days every year,  without enabling SRP (software restriction policy), UAC, but just using virtualization (virtualbox or vmware), virustotal and common sense, and the main host OS didn't get infected ever until the HDD died out this June.
I didn't even have to resort to using sandboxing tools and backup restoration software like acronis or or the much better option Eazy Fix — Windows Time Machine.

It was used to test software and cracks, browse dangerous script injecting sites, hacking sites, watch porn/movies/anime,visits lots of warez site and the main OS never got infected  as everything is done thru guest OSes.
Just revert the guest OS using a little common sense and all are good as it was before.

[plb4333]

On 12/30/2020 at 2:23 PM, Sylence said:

 

not for regular customers, only enterprises that pay for it each year and it's not forever.

 

security updates in Windows update are more important than you think.

Using  '0patch'  works great for security update patches on Windows 7

[Sylence]

1 hour ago, plb4333 said:

Using  '0patch'  works great for security update patches on Windows 7

 

 

and what is that? link? source? is it official from Microsoft?

[MrZeb]

On 1/1/2021 at 11:39 AM, Sylence said:

 

and what is that? link? source? is it official from Microsoft?

 

It's a paid service from another company https://blog.0patch.com/2020/11/0day-in-windows-7-and-server-2008-r2.html

 

Its possible to use the service for free but they only provide some patches, not all to the free users.

[Sylence]

2 hours ago, MrZeb said:

 

It's a paid service from another company https://blog.0patch.com/2020/11/0day-in-windows-7-and-server-2008-r2.html

 

Its possible to use the service for free but they only provide some patches, not all to the free users.

 

I wouldn't trust a 3rd party company to patch my OS.

 

the wise thing to do would be to use Windows 10 and stay up to date, cut the 3rd parties.

[UberGeek]

On 12/30/2020 at 10:44 PM, aum said:

At NetMarketShare, for example, the numbers at the end of 2020 show Windows 10 usage up 11 points, from 63.0% to 74.0%, while Windows 9 usage dropped 9.5 points, from 31.2% to 21.7%.

 

Likewise, StatCounter Global Stats showed the number of PCs running Windows 10 increased more than 12 percent, from 64.7% to 76.0%, while the Windows 7 PC population dropped nearly 10 points to 17.7%.

I was a late adopter of Windows 10 . . . started with build 1903 and hated it so much that the return to 8.1 was almost immediate (all because of an annoying little bug.) Tried Windows 10 yet again (when build 1909 was released) but the bug remained unfixed. It was with build 2004 that finally the issue was resolved for me and now, the present 20H2 I'm running, has become my daily driver.

 

Looking at the quoted statistics, it's easy to understand why there's been this uptake with more folks taking to Windows 10. The recent releases are pretty awesome and the native security system is top-notch.

[SamS5ID]

On 1/3/2021 at 1:39 AM, Sylence said:

 

I wouldn't trust a 3rd party company to patch my OS.

 

the wise thing to do would be to use Windows 10 and stay up to date, cut the 3rd parties.

Agreed!!! But about the Windows 7, some still prefer using it not because they are a fool or not smart enough to move to Windows 10, it's because some of them still using old hardware and still working fine. Also, some apps and drivers is not working on Windows 10, so for these reasons, some still chooses to stay on Windows 7. I, myself use Windows 10 for my main system, but using Windows 7 for fixing phone / STB / flashing / etc.

[UberGeek]

On 1/6/2021 at 12:30 AM, SamS5ID said:

Agreed!!! But about the Windows 7, some still prefer using it not because they are a fool or not smart enough to move to Windows 10, it's because some of them still using old hardware and still working fine. Also, some apps and drivers is not working on Windows 10, so for these reasons, some still chooses to stay on Windows 7. I, myself use Windows 10 for my main system, but using Windows 7 for fixing phone / STB / flashing / etc.

I experienced just one such issue on a old hardware, on all previous Windows 10 releases  . . . the Qualcomm Bootloader driver for my OnePlus would install but fail to function (even after being installed in Test Mode.) This was forcing me into using my mobile Bootloading on my secondary PC with Windows 7.

Strangely, this issue got fixed with the latest 20H2 release . . . the very same version of Qualcomm Bootloader driver is now fully operational on Windows 10, too.

 

The 20H2 is riding proud on a 9-year old hardware and I've also installed it (for others) on hardware older than even mine, using Windows 7 drivers judiciously.