Here's why Windows 10 is likely to replace Windows 7 faster than Windows 7 replaced XP

A lot of Windows users are still running Windows XP, but the majority of users are currently running Windows 7. With Windows 7’s mainstream support set to end on 2020, most Windows 7 users are expected to upgrade to Windows 10 soon. A good portion of the number of active users on Windows 7 are mostly enterprises, who will likely upgrade to Windows 10 before the mainstream support for Windows 7 ends.

According to a new report from Gartner, 85% of enterprises are expected to start deploying Windows 10 by the end of 2017. The main reason behind the migration for most companies was the security improvements. 38% of organizations are also deploying Windows 10 because of the new cloud integration features, and 34% are apparently upgrading to Windows 10 because of the Universal Windows Platform which is quite surprising to see. But of course, a lot of organizations are upgrading because of Windows 7’s mainstream support ending in 2020.

“Organizations recognize the need to move to Windows 10, and the total time to both evaluate and deploy Windows 10 has shortened from 23 months to 21 months between surveys that Gartner did during 2015 and 2016. Large businesses are either already engaged in Windows 10 upgrades or have delayed upgrading until 2018. This likely reflects the transition of legacy applications to Windows 10 or replacing those legacy applications before Windows 10 migration takes place,” said Ranjit Atwal, research director at Gartner.

It will be interesting to see whether Gartner’s data actually turns out to be accurate. It’s unlikely 85% of organizations will upgrade to Windows 10 by the end of this year, as we are still a few years away from the end of Windows 7’s mainstream support.