Ear to the ground and you hear that Microsoft may be changing the update cycle of Windows 11, proving the ‘two updates /year’ software as a service has not been deemed a success. Windows 10 was launched back in 2015 with the promise of receiving two major updates per year, this gave IT Pro’s a challenge in managing Windows 10 versions and ensuring they were using a version that was in support.
More recently with Windows 10 we have seen a major release occur in the first half of the year and a fix and polish version release in the fall. With the launch of Windows 11 we moved to an annual cadence for Windows 11 and three years of support which has given IT Pro’s piece of mind.
So within a year of the launch of Windows 11, Microsoft intends to ship major versions of the Windows client every three years, meaning the next major client release will be 2024, and also meaning there will not be a Windows 11 23H2 (aka Sun Valley 3)
Its not all bad news .. lets take a Moment
Microsoft has been bringing up to speed it “Moments” engineering efforts to release new features and functionality to the current version of Windows every couple of months.
These features will be tested (as you would expect) via the Windows Insider programme (Beta & Dev channels) and then made available to Windows 11 through Windows Update. Microsoft has already tested this process with the rollout of the taskbar weather button.
I think this will be widely welcomed by Edu IT Pro’s as the two times a year cadence was a nightmare to keep following, and some would feel the quality assurance of what we being released was some times not as good as it should have been.
What are your thoughts about moving back to a three year cadence with added Moments? Leave a comment below!
Edtech thoughts for the wider world 