Windows XP celebrates its 20th anniversary ^↺

When Windows 10 made its debut in 2015, Windows XP was already discontinued. Now, Windows 10 is ready to make room for Windows 11, which is scheduled to arrive this fall. However, Windows XP, although gone, is not forgotten and more than just a few thousand people are still using it. In fact, we can talk about millions.

Released to manufacturing on August 24, 2001, Windows XP took a few months to hit the market, an event that took place in October of the same year. According to former Microsoft Project Director for Windows XP Iain McDonald, who shared his thoughts on this anniversary on LinkedIn, "For those of us on the team, XP was a continuation of what we’d done with the release Windows2000 (Win2k), 20 months earlier. Whereas Win2k was focused on corporate users, XP was bringing that stability goodness from Win2k to consumers. I was Project Manager for Win2k and Project Director for XP."

Since Windows XP was the first Windows version not to be based on MS-DOS and/or the Windows 95 kernel, it is now obvious why it was the most stable Windows to that date. Windows XP survived the arrival of Windows Vista (2007) without breaking a sweat, although its market share slowly started to go down since then. Now, its market share is minuscule, between 0.32 and 0.59 percent (according to NetMarketShare and StatCounter). However, these microscopic percentages translate to millions of Windows XP users.

How is life for a Windows XP user in 2021? Without feature or security updates in years and without the chance to run many contemporary pieces of software, it's certain that these users are not living happy lives. Why and how are they still clinging to the Windows XP ship which has been sunk for a few good years, we can only hope to see in the comments section. Windows XP users, feel free to go ahead and share your stories with the rest of us. I know I'll be raising a glass to Windows XP and all those memories involving it next Tuesday. 

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