Around 27 million devices are now running on Windows 10, according to estimates.
Neowin's Brad Sams reports that Microsoft insiders say that the number of PCs that have been upgraded to Windows 10 are now more than 25 million and could be, in fact, as high as 27 million.
Although Microsoft has not confirmed the new number, it is likely to be right around the mark, since Microsoft itself announced that devices that received the upgrade shot up to 14 million within the first 24 hours that the software firm unleashed Windows 10 to the world, indicating that there was huge demand for the OS even before Microsoft pushed it out on July 29.
"While we now have more than 14 million devices running Windows 10, we still have many more upgrades to go before we catch up to each of you that reserved your upgrade," says Yusuf Mehdi, head of Xbox business strategy and marketing at Microsoft.
To put the numbers into a bit of context, let's look at how many copies of older Windows Microsoft sold. In 2012, then CEO Steve Ballmer announced that the company sold 4 million copies of Windows 8 in four days. He also said Windows 8 adoption was faster than Windows 7. However, not all of those sales were made directly to consumers. Since Microsoft also sells licenses to device manufacturers, there were likely less than 4 million computers running the OS during that time.
However, it should also be noted that Windows 8 was pushed out as a product for sale. People had to pay to get the OS on their devices, while Windows 10 is being offered for free.
Not that the skyrocketing adoption rates for Windows 10 should be dismissed. With more people running the latest OS on their devices, it will be easier for Microsoft to attract developers to work on its platform and create more apps for the Windows Store.
Of course, Microsoft still has a long way to go to reach its own self-imposed deadline of distributing Windows 10 to 1 billion devices worldwide by 2017.
Currently, the firm is rolling out Windows 10 in stages, and it is prioritizing users of Windows 8.1 and Windows 7, which comprise around half of all Windows users.
