Windows XP Remains More Popular than Windows 7, Vista Combined

August 2, 2010 By Nick Mokey

After passing Windows Vista in market share for July, Windows 7 still has a long way to go before toppling its predecessor.

Considering the profits flowing in from Windows 7 sales pretty much single-handedly vaulted Microsoft to record profits this year, you might think a graying Windows XP has finally taken a back seat to its younger, better-looking brother. And you might be wrong.

According to Net Applications, Windows XP retains more operating system market share than both Windows 7 and Windows Vista combined. Its latest figures show July as the first month Windows 7 actually passed Vista in market share – holding 14.46 percent to Vista’s 14.34 percent – while XP still dominates with 61.87 percent.

By comparison, Apple Max OS X 10.6 owns 2.48 percent of the market, and OS X 10.5, 1.82 percent.

The persisting loyalty of Windows XP users has proven to be a sticky situation for Microsoft as it attempts to move its operating system forward. The company was repeatedly forced to extend availability for the operating system long after it said it would pull it from shelves, and recently announced that it would extend downgrade rights as well – the ability to switch from Windows 7 down to Windows XP. Those rights were set to expire July 12, but gripes from business customers forced Microsoft to extend them all the way to 2020.

Showing 7 comments

Dethroned at 7:35am 25th October 2010 @ Doug Glass - quite whining like a little baby. it's the internet, there's no need to be formal all the time.
1. Dethroned at 7:37am 25th October 2010 *quit
rick at 7:02am 25th October 2010 i still hate vista and windows 7. i hate the layout of it. i hate the fact that microsoft changed the names of some parts of it in control panel such as instead of add/remove in xp to remove a program, the user must now use programs and features. also, i used to be able to change my desktop's settings with a right click then to properties but vista and win7 changed all that. microsoft also made claims when it first came into being that the os would always be user friendly. they lied again as usual. how about building an os that doesn't need antivirus or antimalware or antispyware? i'll tell you why...GREED!!!! it is all about money and they're all in cahoots together. they write the viruses and they also sell you the program(s) to remove them.
1. Doug Glass at 7:22am 25th October 2010 Wow, maybe if you tried a few upper case letters in strategic locations (first word in a sentence, the letter "i" when it refers to you and etc.) you might sound like something other than a petulant 3rd grader who just got sent to his room without his milk and cookies.
sirwallis at 4:52pm 23rd September 2010 is windows slowly getting eaten up by linux/unix systems or will windows join the linux kernal and develop windows with the penguin kernal ????????????????????
anonymous at 12:16am 3rd August 2010 Windows 7 is Vista successfully marketed. XP is still the most customizable OS. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_features_removed_in_Windows_7 and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_features_removed_in_Windows_Vista
ioman at 4:50pm 2nd August 2010 Not Surprised, XP has been our a lot longer. I do think Windows 7 will catch up eventually.