Windows 8 Ships Over 200 Million Copies, Still Lags Behind Windows 7

Microsoft have revealed that their latest operating system, Windows 8, has just surpassed 200 million licenses sold. This is a great milestone for both Microsoft and Windows, but it’s still a slower growth rate than what was seen with the launch of Windows 7.

It was back in May 2013 that Microsoft revealed that Windows 8 has sold more than 100 million licenses since it’s original release in mid-2012. Although given that Windows 7 hit a target of 240 million licenses after just one year, it’s obvious that Windows 8 still has some way to go.

Of course Windows 7 had a big helping hand by being a saviour for all of us suffering at the hands of Vista, which was well known to be bloated and slow. Windows 8 on the other hand is in many ways a great OS, but many see no reason to upgrade from Windows 7 since it works very well already.

“Windows 8 has surpassed 200 million licenses sold, and we continue to see momentum. This number includes Windows licenses that ship on a new tablet or PC, as well as upgrades to Windows 8. The figure does not include volume license sales to enterprise.” Said a Microsoft spokesperson while speaking with Pocket-Lint.

Growth has been slow for Windows 8, but this same lull in sales can be seen in many parts of the PC market as the demand for mobile products continues to grow. With Windows 8.1 Update 1 on the way in a couple of months time, Microsoft will be looking at streamlining the Windows 8 memory and disk space requirements as they look to allow 8.1 to run on lower-end and smaller tablets, perhaps that will providing them the boost they need to take Windows 8 to the next level.

Thank you Pocket-Lint for providing us with this information.