Windows 10 is now on 800 million devices – should hit a billion in 2020

Progress has been relatively slow but steady for Microsoft’s OS

Windows 10 is edging ever closer towards the magic billion marks, with news emerging that the operating system has now been installed on over 800 million devices globally.

That’s according to Yusuf Mehdi, Corporate VP of Modern Life and Devices Group at Microsoft, who announced the milestone on Twitter.

Microsoft has also updated it's by the numbers’ website to reflect the new total of 800 million.

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The last official update we had on how widespread Windows 10 has become was delivered last September, at Microsoft’s Ignite 2018 conference, when we heard that 700 million devices had been reached. Windows 10 hit 600 million devices back in November 2017 and made the 500 million mark in May 2017.

Thank you to all our customers and partners for helping us achieve 800 million #Windows10 devices and the highest customer satisfaction in the history of Windows. https://t.co/G3CRdkFoPT pic.twitter.com/je9kvBvYhj

— Yusuf Mehdi (@yusuf_i_mehdi) March 7, 2019

Of course, when Windows 10 was first released back in mid-2015, Microsoft famously declared that it envisaged the OS being on a billion devices in two to three years.

2020 vision

So at the latest, the software giant really wanted to see a billion reached in the middle of 2018, but given the current pace of adoption, it looks like that milestone won’t roll around until 2020 – five years after Windows 10 was first unleashed.

Windows 10 has been having a rocky time of it lately, with the most recent update for the OS – the October 2018 Update – being fraught with various problems, which have meant that it has rolled out at a veritable snail’s pace.

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