News Windows 11 market share declines as users seemingly shift back to Windows 10

[Admin]

Despite many efforts by Microsoft, many users are still sticking with Windows 10 while the new reports by Statcounter showing many users worldwide migrated from Windows 11 last year.

Windows 11 market share declines as users seemingly shift back to Windows 10 : Read more

 

[slightnitpick]

raising doubts about Microsoft's inability to listen

Accidental double negative. We don't doubt MS's inability to listen.

 

[sadsteve]

The only thing that's made Win 11 palatable to me is running Open Shell and ExplorerPatcher. If those programs didn't exist, I'd still be running Win 10.

 

[JamesJones44]

I ended up going back to 10. MS never fixed the shutter issue a lot of people are having with Hyper-V and some frame shuttering that occurs with various games (Microsoft Flight Simulator for example). None of those issues exist for me when using Windows 10. I've tested Win 11 every new release and those issues still exist. I'm not the only one, a quick search will show people having similar issues with Win 11, but works fine with Win 10.

 

[hotaru251]

WIN11's "perks" were: the native app store & direct storage..both of which will supported on WIN10. (and the app failing to be good)

Every other WIN11 change is a straight downgrade from 10.

MS should of learned from XP & then 8....people do NOT like "upgrading" to a worse experience (vista & 7) nor do they like changing soemthing they got use to over 10-20+ yrs.

Forced updates, forcing cortana, future of forcing ai/llms into windows, telemetry, etc....nobody wants to deal with it so they have no reason to move to a newer version so long as odler one still functions.

 

[ET3D]

What's also interesting is that the long-obsolete Windows 7 can be seen enjoying a certain market share over Windows 8.0 and 8.1.

What's more interesting is that in the stats Windows 8 has been going up for the past couple of months, from 0.22% to 0.28% to 0.36%. Win 8.1 has gone up from 0.61% in September 2023 to 1.73% in January 2024, then dropped to 0.44% in March and the up to 0.53% in April.

All of which goes to suggest that the stats aren't a true representation of OS use. We know that the Steam survey varies a lot with the sampling. I'm not sure how this survey is done, but it might suffer from similar ills.

 

[in_the_loop]

WIN11's "perks" were: the native app store & direct storage..both of which will supported on WIN10. (and the app failing to be good)

Every other WIN11 change is a straight downgrade from 10.

MS should of learned from XP & then 8....people do NOT like "upgrading" to a worse experience (vista & 7) nor do they like changing soemthing they got use to over 10-20+ yrs.

Forced updates, forcing cortana, future of forcing ai/llms into windows, telemetry, etc....nobody wants to deal with it so they have no reason to move to a newer version so long as odler one still functions.

I completely disagree.
For starters, Windows 11 is much superior to 10 for us with multiple monitors.
Second, for us with the newer Intel processors that have P and E-cores, Windows 11 is a must to run. Windows 10 isn't optimized for them.
I also like Windows 11:s task manager better.
More things have moved to the newer settings part of windows.
I feel like it starts quicker and is overall snappier.
It is more optimized than 10 and has lower requirements.
For most things though it is almost similar to Windows 10 so for me it only has advantages and besides that is very similar to 10.

 

[Silas Sanchez]

Going win10 at its end of life i really questioned this for my pc, but 11 is just a bridge too far and it has just gotten worse and worse. its too different that many older stuff wont run, the explorer layout is for me awful. The M$ doctrine is de evolve, break, re invent, they have ruined windows and they cant come up with real innovation. I have 10 setup so well even got old vista wmp11 back, defender the menace is gone, now my hdds wont die in 2years!. Lets make 10 popular! and so M$ can actually focus on fixing it's awful flaws.

 

[wpontius18]

Clearly Microsoft has little if any concern for user satisfaction or input. I have been running Windows 11 since its release and don't find it dramatically different to Windows 10. Most changes are minor cosmetic, functional and menu changes in Settings requiring small changes in my behavior and use. Have not liked the start menu since the Windows 8 & 8.1 changes, but the programs to change the start menu seem to cause additional problems that make tolerating the start menu as-is a better option.

I don't find the strict hardware requirements of Windows 11 give it any security benefit over Windows 10, with Secure Boot and TPM supported. The minor internal changes to Windows 11 don't seem to offer any more protection than the hardening of Windows 10 would. These hardware requirements will only accomplish increasing the e-waste problem over the next 5 years.

 

[umeng2002_2]

I still like how Windows 11 auto-hides all new taskbar icons; so every time you install a new program, you have to remember to unhide the icon.

 

[cryoburner]

The people writing these articles need to think a bit more about what they are posting, rather than just rehashing something they saw posted elsewhere online. It should be obvious just from the chart in the article that the statcounter data is flawed, and most definitely not accurate enough to interpret meaningful month-to-month trends from. There's no logical reason why the number of systems running Windows 8.1 would have randomly rose significantly for a few months, only to drop back to almost nothing immediately thereafter. That should be a red flag that the data is unreliable right there.

Likewise, seeing Windows 11 usage slowly rising over the course of a year, while Windows 10 usage was slowly dropping, only for the two to reverse direction within the last couple months. Clearly, people are not moving from Windows 11 to Windows 10 in significant numbers, at least not enough to reverse the overall trend. This could be anything from a browser not reporting accurate OS data, to statcounter getting added to some popular website in a country with a larger install base of older systems. Keep in mind that statcounter is used on less than 1% of websites, and counts individual page views rather than unique systems, so there's a lot of room for inaccuracy to come into play.

As for people not adopting Windows 11 all that quickly, that makes perfect sense. Generally, most won't see the need to go out of their way to update their OS to a new version unless they are moving to a new PC that just happens to have it preinstalled, and there are still many perfectly functional systems that can't install the updated OS due to hardware restrictions. And there hasn't really been much of a pressing need to upgrade to newer hardware over the last couple years, with existing hardware still being very capable of handing most people's needs, and with many who were looking to upgrade having already done so around the time of the lockdowns. And Windows 11 so far hasn't done all that much beyond being Windows 10 with a new coat of paint, so those outside of the tech community haven't exactly had much incentive to try it on their existing systems.

 

[endocine]

Would like to know how MS decides to make changes in the UI, for example, removing features from and centering the taskbar, there must have been a lot of telemetry about that, or are they making these changes for no apparent reason or to drive some other non functional purpose like data gathering delivering ads?

The design decisions seem arbitrary otherwise, losing customization capabilities is bad for users accustomed to a specific layout or workflow. Using win11, its not apparent how these changes lend themselves to better productivity.

 

[nickc120167z]

What's more interesting is that in the stats Windows 8 has been going up for the past couple of months, from 0.22% to 0.28% to 0.36%. Win 8.1 has gone up from 0.61% in September 2023 to 1.73% in January 2024, then dropped to 0.44% in March and the up to 0.53% in April.

All of which goes to suggest that the stats aren't a true representation of OS use. We know that the Steam survey varies a lot with the sampling. I'm not sure how this survey is done, but it might suffer from similar ills.

That is because if there is a drive failure on a windows 8 computer upgraded to win 10 you cannot reinstall win 10 now without a license since MS discontinued the free win 10 upgrade last September.

 

[endocine]

Second, for us with the newer Intel processors that have P and E-cores, Windows 11 is a must to run. Windows 10 isn't optimized for them.
I also like Windows 11:s task manager better.

Windows 10 functions fine with Alder/Raptor Lake. Some techtubers also did tests with this and found nothing discernible in gaming. Its also possible to disable the ecores if you are a gamer, and that too has no real noticeable impact. The competition to Alder/Raptor Lakes is 7800X3d, which only has 8 cores and performs better in gaming. Task manager is a user preference and subjective thing, but losing customization options isn't "better", thats a slap in the face, or rather living under the boot of a monopolistic company thats forcing its will on users and stealing all their data.

It is more optimized than 10 and has lower requirements.

Win11 actually has worse requirements, for example, MS now requires (with work-arounds of course, but not obvious or advertised) an online MS account login to install. There is also a TPM requirement, this is also not good because it renders a lot of older hardware obsolete that would otherwise work totally fine. Also, Win11 will place a water mark on PCs that don't have NPUs (AI acceleration) for the unnecessary and looking for a problem copilot AI assistant. How were you measuring that win10 had higher system requirements?

 

[phxrider]

Windows 11 will gain market share as PCs are replaced. Quite a few people are running older PCs that don't even run Windows 11 due to the TPM requirement (and they aren't technically inclined enough to bypass it) - this is ANY consumer desktop running a CPU made before they started putting TPMs on chip - and if they aren't gamers, there is no real reason to upgrade for them. Corporations don't tend to upgrade in place either, they upgrade when the user's laptop goes out of support or off lease, and they replace it. Some will stay on Windows 10 until EOL for continuity and ease of support (AKA not having to change - change gives corporations fits and costs money).

It's not a statement on Windows 11 sucking like some people are making it out to be.

Seriously, if you're crying about the taskbar being centered, you are a symptom of a society that has had it so good that they need to look for and invent problems. If they didn't make Windows 11, you'd be complaining that Windows looks dated compared to macOS and some Linux flavors. Always something....

 

[endocine]

Windows 11 will gain market share as PCs are replaced. Quite a few people are running older PCs that don't even run Windows 11 due to the TPM requirement (and they aren't technically inclined enough to bypass it) - this is ANY consumer desktop running a CPU made before they started putting TPMs on chip - and if they aren't gamers, there is no real reason to upgrade for them. Corporations don't tend to upgrade in place either, they upgrade when the user's laptop goes out of support or off lease, and they replace it. Some will stay on Windows 10 until EOL for continuity and ease of support (AKA not having to change - change gives corporations fits and costs money).

It's not a statement on Windows 11 sucking like some people are making it out to be.

Seriously, if you're crying about the taskbar being centered, you are a symptom of a society that has had it so good that they need to look for and invent problems. If they didn't make Windows 11, you'd be complaining that Windows looks dated compared to macOS and some Linux flavors. Always something....

Sounds like you are apologizing for MS's bad design decisions. Is it really acting out or immature to complain when features are removed, or even prevented from being restored, that allow you work more efficiently? So change the way the OS works just because it might look dated, even if its clunky? The users aren't inventing problems, MS is doing that, with change for the sake of change vs change because "it works better, more efficiently, is faster". Don't forget its not just centering, win11 allows moving it to the left, it just lacks the customization that was available before, and is still present in the OS.

 

[slightnitpick]

Seriously, if you're crying about the taskbar being centered, you are a symptom of a society that has had it so good that they need to look for and invent problems.

You make some good points, but engineered obsolescence had been a bad thing society-wise and environmentally-wise for many decades (yes, even just engineered obsolescence of user interfaces[1]). It's part of the reason people find it difficult to save for a rainy day or retirement. Engineered obsolescence is the means by which manufacturers create rainy days in order to drain our rainy day funds.

[1] - It's still possible to run WordPerfect for DOS on Windows 11 - https://mendelson.org/wpdos/ . But try getting that default taskbar behavior back now that MS is going out of its way to disable third-party solutions.

 

[phxrider]

Sounds like you are apologizing for MS's bad design decisions. Is it really acting out or immature to complain when features are removed, or even prevented from being restored, that allow you work more efficiently? So change the way the OS works just because it might look dated, even if its clunky? The users aren't inventing problems, MS is doing that, with change for the sake of change vs change because "it works better, more efficiently, is faster". Don't forget its not just centering, win11 allows moving it to the left, it just lacks the customization that was available before, and is still present in the OS.

I'm not apologizing for anything. Once you get used to it, it's just as good or better than 10. Yes, it's change. Yes, that means there's a learning curve, however minor. Life goes on.

Most people don't care about customizing every nook and cranny of their OS. This is who Microsoft is targeting. OCD nerds are a niche category, and realistically, most of them pirate the OS anyway and don't pay for it.

 

[phxrider]

[1] - It's still possible to run WordPerfect for DOS on Windows 11 - https://mendelson.org/wpdos/ . But try getting that default taskbar orientation back now that MS is going out of its way to disable third-party solutions.

Yeah, it seems a little control-freaky to me as well that they want to block things like Classic Shell / Open Shell. That, I don't get.

 

[baboma]

>The people writing these articles need to think a bit more about what they are posting, rather than just rehashing something they saw posted elsewhere online.

You're missing the point of THW's "daily news" pieces, which is primarily to generate clicks (yes, clickbait). The low-effort way to do this is to employ odd/sensationalistic/controversial "news".

Anything that is of X-vs-Y nature, or something-something-sucks, falls into the controversial slot, and is particularly effective in generate reader response. This "oh no Windows 11 is failing!" piece has brought the usual complaints out of the woodwork. There's nothing new about this.

Put another way, all of the people responding to this piece, including yours truly, are being trolled.

This is not to denigrate THW's staff, but to recognize the simple fact that online tech "news," being ad-supported, have low value, and reporters have corresponding low pay, especially for freelancers as with this and many THW pieces. You won't find any Pulitzer-effort reporting here.

And if the end goal is to generate enough revenue for THW to stay afloat, then sure, I'm willing to be trolled. But people should at least understand that, yes, they are being manipulated to click on certain headlines. That's what clickbait means.

 

[truerock]

I have been using Windows 11 for over 2 years for business. I still use Windows 10 at home.
I have decades of experience designing user interfaces for Windows PC applications.

IMHO... Microsoft's best Windows GUI was Windows XP - or, perhaps Windows 7.
Microsoft Office GUI is excellent and has resisted changes from Microsoft Windows.

Windows 11 is technically superior to older versions of Windows - but, the Windows 11 GUI is significantly inferior to the Windows XP (or, Windows 7) GUI.

Again IMHO, in general - I have no interest in Microsoft supporting obsolete and outdated technology. It is my belief that one of the reasons Apple is technically superior to Microsoft is that Apple is ruthless in regard to getting rid of obsolete technology.

Another important issue is that Microsoft has made significant blunders in trying to use Apple iOS GUI design techniques in Windows desktop GUIs. Touchscreen designs for iPhones do not translate to 27-inch desktop PC GUI for Windows. Apple has itself struggled with regard to 5-inch touch-screen iOS, 12-inch iPad and 27-inch Mac OS - but, Apple has made interesting strides in melding touch-screen and mouse-keyboard.

Again, IMHO... an extremely smart thing that Microsoft could do is put the Microsoft Office team in charge of Windows GUI.

 

[USAFRet]

IMHO... Microsoft's best Windows GUI was Windows XP

Thats funny.

People completely forget the hatefest that came with the release of XP. Especially the look of the GUI.

 

[truerock]

I think another interesting point to think about is the idea of the Microsoft Window "Start Button".

By the mid-90s it was clear that desktop icons were an unworkable GUI element. PC users were acquiring dozens of apps and had thousands of files. Desktop icons could not handle the situation.

Application and/or document launch bars and/or buttons were a clear solution and there were dozens of available launch-button products available to choose from for Windows PCs. Almost all of these launch-buttons would allow the button to be any size or color. You could have as many launch buttons as you wanted and they could be placed anywhere on the desktop at any defined GUI layer (top, bottom or somewhere in between).

When Microsoft knew it had to have launch buttons on its next version of Windows (Windows 95) - it had one button of one size and color in the bottom left corner. This was obviously a bizarre decision but was endemic of Microsoft's incomprehensible GUI incompetence.

 

[cryoburner]

You're missing the point of THW's "daily news" pieces, which is primarily to generate clicks (yes, clickbait). The low-effort way to do this is to employ odd/sensationalistic/controversial "news".

That wasn't lost on me, and I actually had the word 'clickbait' in that sentence before adjusting it to make it sound a bit nicer. : D

While such articles might help them meet short-term traffic goals, in the long run those kinds of tactics will negatively impact the site's credibility. Becoming known for mostly posting articles of dubious quality that only rephrase content found elsewhere online isn't going to help them retain a user-base, especially as AI makes it easier for countless other sites to crop up doing the exact same thing. If they are not producing interesting original content, or at least ensuring a certain degree of quality in the kinds of things they repost, they will lose readership.

Either way, I felt it was reasonable to correct the misinformation to perhaps spare someone from being misdirected by it.

 

[NedSmelly]

It should be obvious just from the chart in the article that the statcounter data is flawed, and most definitely not accurate enough to interpret meaningful month-to-month trends from.

Indeed. But look at the engagement!

There's no logical reason why the number of systems running Windows 8.1 would have randomly rose significantly for a few months, only to drop back to almost nothing immediately thereafter.

Going off on a tangent here… but I quite liked Win8.1. If one ignored the wacky tile interface, it was a fairly solid OS. Little if no telemetry; no nag popups; font scaling that worked well for high dpi; a properly configurable version of File History; light on resources, performed well on low spec hardware; and good cross-version hardware driver compatibility. Tiles also eventually grew on me as an ad-hoc productivity ‘focus’ feature.