Windows 10: big jump in usage share in August 2015

Windows 10 has been out for little over a month; reason enough to find out how the operating system did usage share wise.

NetMarketShare's published desktop operating system usage share statistics for August 2015 indicate that Microsoft's new operating system Windows 10 jumped straight to position four of the most used operating system from not being in the top 10 a month earlier.

It surpassed Linux, all Mac OS X editions as well as Windows Vista and Windows 8 in that single month.

According to NetMarketShare's data, it is holding a usage share of 5.21% currently. The three operating system versions in front of it are Windows 8.1 with 11.39%, Windows XP with 12.14% and Windows 7 with its dominating 57.67%.

Windows 10 rose by 4.28% compared to the month before while both Windows 8.1 and Windows 7 lost usage share ( 1.72% and 3.06% respectively). Windows XP interestingly enough gained 0.42% but that is more of an indicator that these stats are not set in stone and can fluctuate quite a bit depending on certain factors.

The rise is fueled by Microsoft's marketing efforts to get existing customers to upgrade to Windows 10. The company announced early on that Windows 10 would be a free upgrade and advertised that fact on systems running Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 through updates.

But how impressive is a 5% leap in a single month? It depends. On the one hand, it highlights that Windows 10 is doing quite well one month after release especially since upgrades are pushed out gradually and not at once.

It is also doing quite well when you compare Windows 10's month to the first month of Windows 8. Windows 8, released October 2012, managed to jump barely over the 1% mark in usage share after the first month of release.

One could argue that Windows 8 had a tougher play-field as it succeeded the highly successful Windows 7 operating system while Windows 10 had it much easier as it succeeds Windows 8 which did not get rave reviews.

Compared to Windows 7, Windows 10 is not nearly doing as well. Windows 7 managed to jump to more than 4% in the first month after release. Limited discounted upgrade offers and family packs certainly helped, as did the fact that it succeeded Windows Vista, another ill-liked operating system.

Accuracy-issues aside, it seems that Windows 10 is off to a good start. The real question is whether Microsoft can keep up the momentum once it has served the majority of free upgrade customers.

Now You: Can Windows 10 stand on its own and continue its rise?

Update: Steam Hardware survey stats are in for the month of August 2015. Windows 10 jumped to 16.39% in that month, a gain of 13.17% over last month. It snagged away percentages from Windows 7 and windows 8.1 mainly in the process. While that is remarkable, it needs to be noted that Steam users are generally faster when it comes to upgrading hardware and software (like operating systems) because of game requirements.