Windows 10 UK market share enjoys sharpest rise in six months

Statcounter figures show Windows 7 is in steep decline in the UK

Windows 10 has enjoyed its sharpest market share spike in six months, as Windows 7 suffered its steepest decline over the same period, being overtaken by iOS for the first time.

According to data from Statcounter, Windows 10's UK market share stands at 32.38 per cent this month, up 1.69 percentage points on December. The spike is its biggest in the last six months, during which time Statcounter claims share fell twice month on month.

Windows 10's spike comes as forerunner Windows 7 suffers the opposite fate - its sharpest decline in UK market share over the same period.

Statcounter claims that the operating system's share stands at 15.59 per cent in January, a fall of 5.67 percentage points since December. Windows 7's share was overtaken by that of iOS for the first time, after its share rose to 18.58 per cent.

Windows 10's UK share has steadily tracked upwards since June, while Windows 7's has fallen. Six months ago, the duo swapped places, with Windows 10 becoming the most popular UK OS, and Windows 7 coming in second place.

Windows 10 was launched in the summer of 2015 and the latest Microsoft figures show that it is running on 400 million devices across 192 countries.