14 DAY TRIAL // Windows 8.1 continues its growth and a new round of statistics provided by market researcher Net Applications shows that Microsoft's new OS version has boosted the number of adopters so much that it finally passed Windows 8's market share in May 2014.
Windows 8.1 currently has a market share of 6.35 percent, according to these new figures, while Windows 8 is currently installed on 6.29 percent of the desktop computers worldwide, pushing the overall market share of Microsoft's modern operating system to 12.64 percent.
Figures are obviously expected to grow in the favor of Windows 8.1, as all Windows 8 users can install this OS update free of charge straight from the store.
In fact, that's what Microsoft actually hopes, as Windows 8.1 brings many improvements to the core Windows 8 operating system, including a Start button, Start screen improvements, a new Internet Explorer version and several other Start screen customization tweaks that could make the platform as a whole more appropriate for both desktop computers and tablets.
As far as the other operating systems in the charts are concerned, Windows 7 continues to be the leading choice all over the world, with a share of 50.06 percent, followed by Windows XP with 25.27 percent and dropping as more users complete the migration to a new OS version.