The latest editions of Microsoft’s flagship operating system, in particular Windows 10, turned its update mechanism into the headache of more than one person.
Windows 11 will arrive with a proposal to attack this situation, offering feature improvements concentrated in just one annual update.
The new update schedule for Windows 11
The announcement of a new update schedule for Windows 11 came with the recent presentation of this operating system.
In that instance, Microsoft informed that feature updates, those that usually contain substantial changes at the interface or functionality level, will be released only once a year.
Regular updates, those that provide corrections and patches, will continue to be distributed on a regular basis through Windows Update. However, Microsoft assured us that these will be installed in the background and will be 40% smaller than those we know so far in Windows 10.
As for the extension of the support period, Windows 11 Home and Pro editions will receive 24 months of support, while Enterprise and Education editions will receive 36 months.
Differences with Windows 10 upgrades
Since its first edition introduced in 2015, Windows 10 has mutated quite a bit. Part of that transformation was the reduction from three annual feature updates to a cap of just two.
To respect that schedule, Microsoft released on more than one occasion updates with bugs of various considerations, which were fixed with patches that arrived via subsequent updates. This system meant more than one discomfort for information technology (IT) professionals, who in many cases opted to dispense with some updates in order to ensure the stability of their systems.
And although Microsoft extended its months of support to cover Windows installations maintained in this way, it also offered the possibility of postponing certain updates, to avoid a greater impact and to wait for third-party performance reports.
Windows 11 promises quite a few interesting new features and in this aspect, practice will tell us if this new update schedule really solves the aforementioned problem. At least, the way in which this novelty was presented makes this procedure more friendly.
