Microsoft is ending support for its Windows 10 later this year, after a staggering 10 years of service. It will continue to patch the operating system with security updates until October 14 before it cuts ties. Despite a brief period of conflicting messaging from the company, it seems you’ll still be able to make the jump to Windows 11 after the fact if you haven’t already. However, your 365 apps such as Teams, Outlook, and more may be on the chopping block from then onwards.
In case you missed it, Microsoft published a now-removed blog post entitled ‘Free Upgrade to Windows 11 (For a Limited Time Only)’ to its Tech Community subdomain. Confusingly, the post contained no information about when the company plans to close this path to Windows 10 users. Instead, it primarily served as the latest in a series of nudges urging users to adopt the company’s latest operating system.
It’s in this post that Microsoft also announced it will no longer support its 365 suite (previously known as Office365) from October 14 as well. This doesn’t mean the applications will stop working, but the company notes you should expect to see more “performance and reliability issues over time.” Naturally, upgrading to Windows 11 remedies this potential problem.
Turns out, Microsoft published this blog post in error. Speaking to PCWorld, a company representative told the outlet: “Apologies for the confusion from the Tech Community post. The free Windows 11 upgrade path remains unchanged. We’re working on getting it corrected!” At the time of writing, you won’t find a corrected or replacement post.
No one should rightly expect Microsoft to continue supporting live services on older operating systems in perpetuity. That said, I don’t think we’ll know the full impact of Windows 10’s obsolescence until we’re much closer to that all-important date of October 14. At the very least, consumers deserve to have clear answers on what options are open to them in terms of upgrades and for how long. The path is clear for now but one shouldn’t take it for granted that it’ll always be there.
If you absolutely need continued Windows 10 support, you can get an extra year of coverage for $30. After that, though, you’re out of luck so be sure to save up your pennies for a TPM 2.0 compatible system.
