Windows 10 Picking Up Business Users Twice As Fast As Windows 8, Report Says

Businesses are moving to Windows 10 at a steady clip, reports Spiceworks—about twice as fast as they adopted Windows 8.

In a new report, the online network of IT professionals revisits its prediction (based on user polling) that 40 percent of companies would be using the operating system a year after its launch.

Six months in, Spiceworks now puts the Windows 10 penetration rate in the business world at 18 percent. That’s nearly double the 9.8 percent penetration rate that Windows 8 saw six months after it debuted, according to Spiceworks.

Medium- and large-sized companies are more likely than smaller businesses to have at least one machine on their network running Windows 10, the report says. North America, not surprisingly, shows the highest adoption rate, followed by the combined users from Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

The availability of free upgrades for existing Windows customers, and this week’s shift by Microsoft to make Windows 10 a ‘recommended upgrade’ could continue to drive migration to the new OS—creating a widening customer base for universal Windows apps.

What kinds of apps might those be? Spiceworks cites the highly-regulated manufacturing, energy and construction industries as among the biggest adopters of Windows 10, making those markets interesting targets for software developers.