Windows 10 experienced surprising new popularity on Steam as it nears end-of-support

Steam recently published its hardware & software survey

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Key notes

  • Windows 10 saw a surprising market share increase to 44.41% on Steam in January 2025.
  • Windows 11, on the other hand, dropped 1.42%, holding 55.38% of the market
  • Nvidiaโ€™s RTX 3060/4060 also remain top choices among gamers, as the survey states.
Windows 10 desktop

Windows 10, Microsoft’s popular operating system, is currently near its end-of-support cycle. But, a recent hardware & software survey from Steam reveals that it’s experiencing a surprising jump in popularity.

Steam notes that in January 2025, Windows 10 saw a slight increase of 0.57% in market share and reached 44.41% from the previous month. Windows 11, on the other hand, experienced a 1.42% drop in January 2025 and is currently holding 55.38% of the market.

For long, Windows 10 had been the most popular operating system on Steam despite years after Windows 11’s launch in 2021 as a free update from Windows 10 for PCs that meet the requirements. It was only back in last year’s summer or fall that Windows 11 took the throne and reached 49% of users.

Around the same time, Steam also hit a new milestone with 38.3 million online players, surpassing its previous record of 37 million the month before.

Microsoft’s end-of-support date for Windows 10 is coming on October 14, 2025. After that, your Windows 10 PCs won’t get new features or security updates, unless you purchase a $30 Extended Security Update (ESU) to give that PC or laptop another year of life.

Still from the survey, Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 3060 and 4060 cards remain the top choices for gamers, despite slight drops in popularity. DirectX 8 GPUs also saw an unexpected rise of 19.45%, while DirectX 12 still dominates with 93.17% of the market.

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