Microsoft Sold 40 Million Windows 8 Licenses in 1 Month
Microsoft's cheap upgrade price probably fueled Microsoft's quick 40 million milestone.
Microsoft's Brandon LeBlanc said on Tuesday that after one month of Windows 8's general availability on the market, the new updated OS has sold 40 million licenses. This number is undoubtedly propelled by the insanely cheap price for the upgrade from Windows XP, Vista and Windows 7 to Windows 8 Pro – a mere $39.99 USD for a limited time.
The news actually arrives by way of Tami Reller who revealed the 40 million milestone with industry and financial analysts, investors and media at the Credit Suisse 2012 Annual Technology Conference on Tuesday. "The journey is just beginning, but I am pleased to announce today that we have sold 40 million Windows 8 licenses so far," she said.
LeBlanc added in his blog that Windows 8 is outpacing Windows 7 in terms of upgrades – but that's understandably so as previously mentioned. Microsoft built Windows 8 to work on existing Windows 7 PCs, he said, so that upgrading will be super-easy for even the novice user.
LeBlanc also revealed that the Windows Store, which made its grand opening on the Windows 8 platform, supposedly had more apps at launch than any other app store. An undisclosed number of Windows 8 apps have already crossed the $25,000 revenue mark, and developers actually get to keep 80-percent of the revenue apps generate throughout their lifespan.
Still, is upgrading to Windows 8 really that easy? It was for this customer – the only real difficulty was in deciding if the upgrade needed to be on a separate partition so that Windows 7 and all its installed applications would remain untouched, or to upgrade the entire system. The former option was the original choice, but then switching between the two systems grew too annoying so the partition was deleted and Windows 7 was upgraded to Windows 8 Pro. Piece of cake.
As mentioned in previous reports, the biggest setback for consumers is the lack of a Start menu. Despite how the new touchy OS is promoted, the new Modern UI is merely an overlay that can be ignored if needed. Even more, Stardock's $5 Start8 desktop app not only adds the missing Start menu to the desktop, but allows the OS to boot up into the desktop mode. Microsoft seemingly wants consumers to rely on the new interface from here on out, but the popularity of Stardock's app indicates customers aren't too keen on the idea just yet.
Still, the Modern UI overlay provides a unique tablet/smartphone like experience, making it easy for customers to switch between the PC, Windows Phone 8, Xbox Infinity and Windows 8 tablets. To see if your PC can handle Windows 8, use Microsoft's Upgrade Assistant tool here.
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Kevin Parrish has over a decade of experience as a writer, editor, and product tester. His work focused on computer hardware, networking equipment, smartphones, tablets, gaming consoles, and other internet-connected devices. His work has appeared in Tom's Hardware, Tom's Guide, Maximum PC, Digital Trends, Android Authority, How-To Geek, Lifewire, and others.
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techguy911 Yes and they are all on oem machines sitting around in stores, i run a computer store and sold ZERO copies, my suppliers in Toronto sold a few copies and say it's not selling.Reply
The board i'm on technibble most of have not sold any either and most are downgrading from 8 to 7 for customers and i have done same for laptops that came with windows 8 customers hate it and downgrade to 7.
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Cas_77 Umm there is no choice available between desktop and metro like gnome and kde? well there wont be any w8 sold to meReply -
DRosencraft That is a big one-month number. The challenge is maintaining general good momentum after the price goes back up come February 1. I still believe that a lot of the hate on Win 8 has been overblown, and there are a lot of people who have been scared away from the OS by these overblown stories of how bad it is. Good for MSFT. Soon we will have people who actually want to constructively contribute to improving the system.Reply -
edogawa Windows 8 would have been fantastic for new computers for 40 bucks if it had no metro and had a start menu. I love start8 for bringing back the start menu for Windows 8.Reply
I'm sure Microsoft will reevaluate metro for the desktop and bring back the start button after all the hate. -
elbert I wouldn't say insanely cheap but more insanely reasonable price. Still doesn't match Apples insanely cheap upgrade price of $19.99. Given the first DOS OS was around this price seems M$ may have finally done some analysis of their pricing. I would expect if they continue to make new versions on Apples time line M$ should actually reduce price a bit more.Reply -
internetlad techguy911Yes and they are all on oem machines sitting around in stores, i run a computer store and sold ZERO copies.Reply
You sell as much as you want to sell. You're either a shit salesman or, more likely, don't care for windows 8 and are suggesting customers buy other machines.
I, as well, work for a B&M PC store, and we've sold a couple (not a lot, but a few) windows 8 machines since it's come out. I'll walk everybody through the machines and we have a windows 8 machine with SSD & jacked up specs.
Our first purchase was by a 60-70 year old lady! I threw in a free Windows 8 reference book to ease her through the transition! -
mateos1 Keep in mind that corporations that use microsoft licensing usually purchase software assurance and of those 40 million probably 39.9 million was the already paid software that most wont install at all. the other 100k is on display just waiting to be downgradedReply