Subtitle: The time has come: PC gamers with old Windows versions have been left unsupported by Steam.
The gaming world has reached a critical point in time as Valve, the company behind Steam, has announced that it will no longer support older Windows versions, including Windows 7, Windows 8, and Windows 8.1, starting from January 1, 2024. While this may not seem like a big deal to some players, it has significant implications. Let's delve into the details.
What does it mean?
Valve's announcement signifies that the Steam client will no longer receive updates of any kind, including security updates, on these outdated Windows versions. Furthermore, the Steam support team will not be able to offer assistance when technical issues arise. Valve states that "Steam cannot guarantee the continued functioning of Steam on unsupported versions of Windows." However, Valve expects the Steam client to function on these outdated systems for some time without updates, but it cannot guarantee the continued functionality after January 1, 2024.
Why the move?
The main functions of Steam rely on an integrated version of Google Chrome, which does not work on older Windows versions. Valve also notes that future versions of Steam will require security features present only in Windows 10 and higher. In other words, software that does not support security patches is insecure, and these Windows versions are no longer supported. Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 have been unsupported since January 10, 2023, although some users had extended support for security updates. For instance, Microsoft ended support for Windows 7 on January 14, 2020. Therefore, it makes sense for Steam to abandon these outdated versions.
The scope of the measure
According to Steam's recent hardware survey (as of December 2023), Windows 7 is installed on 0.68% of computers, while Windows 8.1 is installed on 0.15%. This means that the measure will affect less than one in a hundred players. The most popular version of Steam is Windows 10, with a 53.45% market share, followed by Windows 11 with a 41.95% share.
Contrasting data
The aforementioned data from Steam shows that users are generally more up-to-date. However, outside the gaming world, the situation is different. According to StatCounter, Windows 10 has a 67.46% market share, followed by Windows 11 with 26.52%. In third place is Windows 7, with a 3.34% share, and in fourth place is Windows 8.1, with a 1.66% share. For those interested, there is still a 0.64% usage of Windows XP.