Windows ten growth comes to screeching stop

Data shows new Bone lost share in September for commencement time since launch

Microsoft'south Windows 10 beat a retreat concluding month, losing user share for the start time since its debut more than than a yr ago.

According to U.Due south. metrics vendor Net Applications, Windows 10 lost one-half a percentage signal in user share during September, ending the month on 22.v% of all personal computers.

Windows ten powered 24.8% of all machines running Windows: The difference between the user share of all PCs and only those running Windows originated with the fact that Windows powered 91% of all personal computers, not 100%.

September'south turn down was the first since Microsoft officially launched Windows 10 in July 2015, and the only since Jan 2015, months before when Microsoft offered only a preview to beta testers.

Last month's slip came after robust growth in August, when Windows 10 added i.9 pct points to its user share, much more than most expected. That anticipation had been driven by the expiration of the complimentary Windows ten upgrade offer at the end of July.

Other information sources showed the same trend.

Ireland's StatCounter pegged Windows 10'southward usage share -- a mensurate of online activity -- at 24.4% for September, a pass up, admitting a very small one, of one-hundredth of a percentage point. StatCounter's dip, like Net Applications', was the first for Windows 10.

Neither Cyberspace Applications' or StatCounter'due south numbers can be accepted without reservations: Measurements of Bone users or usage conducted by counting visits to websites, which both companies practice, result in estimates, at all-time and provide a glance, if that, at the reality. Depending on methodology and sample size, estimates like these may be wide of the marker. For example, it'due south virtually impossible that the decline in Net Applications' data for Windows 10 meant several millions suddenly turned their PCs over to some other OS.

What's more than important are the trends such data signals. And on that score, it'southward safe to say that Windows ten's nigh rapid growth is now behind it. From now on, Microsoft faces a more than traditional upgrade battle with customers.

Microsoft undoubtedly understood that long earlier Internet Applications or StatCounter: It predictable a pass up in growth two months ago when it begged off the self-fix goal of putting Windows 10 on a billion devices by mid-2018.

win10 growth submarines Data: Net Applications

Windows 10's month-over-month growth rate savage into the negative last month, the offset time since launch that it lost user share.

Copyright © 2016 IDG Communications, Inc.