Windows has lost more than 400 million users

Microsoft no longer likes to talk about the number of users of Windows. Most recently, there was talk that the operating system runs worldwide on over a billion actively used devices. Three years ago there were 400 million more.

400 million users less in three years?

Like the colleagues of Zdnet have noticed that the number of PCs with Windows in recent years seems to have dropped significantly. You refer to numbers that Microsoft has published itself. In a blog entry, Executive Vice President Yusuf Mehdi, the area of ​​responsibility also includes Windows that Windows is currently driving over a billion PCs.

In one of his last annual reports, however, the number of users was significantly higher. So was im Review for the 2022 financial year Still talking about more than 1.4 billion systems with Windows. Since Microsoft’s legal department should certainly have checked the information before the publication, we can probably understand it as facts, even if the data may not be 100 % precise.

Where are all the users going?

A decline in the number of users from 1.4 to 1.0 billion systems within three years should be a bitter loss for Microsoft. However, the numbers have probably not dropped so much because suddenly a different operating system such as Apple’s MacOS or Linux would have increased significantly. The sales figures for computers with MacOS have sank steadily since 2023, while Linux still remains a marginal phenomenon in the client area.

Rather, it is probably smartphones and tablets that have taken the place of the PCs of many users. For many users, the devices with their apps have long since become a sufficient replacement for laptops and desktop PCs, which is why the latter are simply no longer required. In addition to gamers, only companies and professional users remain as large user groups, since the classic private user uses more mobile devices.

Microsoft has not commented on the subject itself, but in recent years it has been noticeable that the Windows version once published with every newly published information about increasing number of users could no longer be heard. At the moment, alleged improvements in terms of security are primarily relying on the sales of new PCs with Windows 11, while support for Windows 10 soon ends.