Category: Windows

2025 was a tough year for many users of Microsoft products. It was the year that support for Windows 10 ended officially, albeit with the option to extend support by a year for consumers and by up to three years for businesses.

Windows 11, version 22H2 support ended just a few months ago for business customers and version 23H2 support ended for consumers as well. Additionally, Microsoft Office 2016 and 2019 reached end of support.

Looking forward, 2026 will be another interesting year. Consumers who run Windows 10 PCs with ESU will no longer get updates from Microsoft after the one-year extension has run its course.

But that is not the only change. Windows 11, version 24H2 reaches end of support as well. Business customers have to upgrade Windows 11, version 23H2 to ensure that their devices remain supported with updates.

Here is the list of products that reach end of support or life in 2026. Note that this may not be complete, as Microsoft does not provide an easily accessible list for all of its products.

Inspiration was taken from the list over at Deskmodder, but I have fine-tuned it somewhat.

Microsoft Windows

• Windows 10 2016 LTSB / IoT Enterprise LTSB 2016 reach end of ESU on October 13th, 2026
• Windows 11, version 23H2 Enterprise/Education/IoT Enterprise editions reach end of support on November 10th, 2026.
• Windows 11, version 24H2 Home/Pro editions reach end of support on October 13th, 2026.
• Windows 11 SE, reaches end of support in October 2026.
• Windows Server 2012 and 2012 R2 reaches end of ESU on October 13th, 2026.
• Windows Server 2022 reaches end of mainstream support on October 14th, 2026. ESU available.

Microsoft Office

• Microsoft Office 2021 reaches end of support on October 13th, 2026.
• Office LTSC 2021 and Office LTSC 2021 for Mac reach end of mainstream support on October 13th, 2026.

Other Microsoft products

• Microsoft .NET 8 (LTS) reaches end of support on November 10th, 2026.
• Microsoft .NET 9 reaches end of support on November 10th, 2026
• PowerShell 7.4 (LTS) reaches end of support on November 10th, 2026.
• SQL Server 2016 reaches end of extended support on July 14th, 2026.

Generally speaking, Microsoft is supporting Windows 11 Home and Pro editions for two years, while business and Enterprise editions get three years of support.

Now You: Do you use a product or service that is reaching end of support this year? What are your plans dealing with this? Feel free to leave a comment down below.

Microsoft released the 2025 feature update for Windows 11 in late September 2025. It was a smaller update that installs like a regular update instead of a bigger feature update. That is probably the main reason why Microsoft enabled broad distribution of the update shortly after its release.

The update should install automatically on most Windows 11 devices, provided that version 24H2 — last year’s feature update — is installed.

However, I noticed on one of my machines that Microsoft was not offering the new feature update via Windows Update.

First thing you may want to do in that case is to check if Microsoft has so-called Safeguard Holds in place.

Good to known: A Safeguard Hold blocks updates from machines, if certain issues are known that affect them. Microsoft uses the system to prevent larger issues on PCs that may be caused by updates.

Windows 11, version 25H2 has just three known issues listed on the official Windows 11 health dashboard. Two of these are listed as resolved, one as mitigated.

You may notice that your system is not affected by any of them. This was the case for the machine in question that I tried to upgrade.

Here are a few extra verification steps:

• Make sure you have all updates installed that are offered via Windows Update. Go to Settings > Windows Update and activate the “check for updates” button.
• Check the “get the latest updates as soon as they’re available” box.
• Make sure the main drive has enough free storage space for the update. If it is low, say less than 20 gigabytes, you may want to consider freeing up space.

How to upgrade to Windows 11, version 25H2

Windows administrators who are in the same position have a few options. The easiest is to install a small enablement package, which upgrades the system to the latest feature update release.

There is a problem: Microsoft is not hosting the update file on its Microsoft Update Catalog website. This means that the download has to come from a third-party website, which needs to be trusted.

My recommendation is to download the package from Deskmodder, a German website with an impeccable record.

1. Download Windows11.0-KB5054156-x64.msu from the website (or another, if you prefer that).
2. Double-click on the update file to run the upgrade.

If things go well, Windows 11 should be upgraded to version 25H2.

Microsoft has accumulated a wealth of downloads over the last four decades or so. From tools and drivers to Windows versions and standalone applications. While some may not be useful anymore at this day and age, other than for a nostalgic look back at how things were back in the good old days, others are still useful.

However, Microsoft is pruning its archives regularly. Means, downloads may be removed and it is becoming increasingly difficult to find them. While third-party sites may offer them, some may add a pinch of malware on top of the downloads, which is a problem especially for inexperienced users or users in a hurry.

Enter the Microsoft Download Center Archive. It is a free site that offers legacy downloads for Microsoft products. You find downloads between the years 2012 and 2025 in the archive, which Microsoft deleted from its own archives.

Here is a glimpse of what you can expect:

• PowerToys and Fun Packs for Windows XP.
• Office Viewers like Word Viewer 2003 or Visio Viewer 2016.
• Old .NET Framework versions.
• Microsoft Visual C++ and Visual Basic Redistributables.
• Windows Help.
• Microsoft Report Viewer.
• And much more.

While the focus is on downloads for older versions of Windows, at least some of the downloads are also compatible with Windows 10 or Windows 11. Furthermore, since Windows 10 is near the end of its support, it is possible that Microsoft is going to remove downloads for Windows 10 in the near future.

These will also be added to the archive then, making it a great resource for users who plan to stick to Windows 10.

The site offers a search and a list of common downloads. You can type the name of an operating system to get all downloads for it, or search for the name of a software or tool instead.

Downloads are hosted at the Internet Archive. They start instantly and do not require an account.

Closing Words

The unofficial Microsoft Download Center Archive is a useful website for Windows users who want to download software that Microsoft removed from its official websites.

How is the last supported Windows operating system doing after Microsoft ended support for its predecessor Windows 10 a month ago? Not so good, at least according to Dell CEO Jeffrey Clarke.

Clarke revealed several information during the company’s latest earnings call. One of them being that Dell believes that there are 500 million Windows 10 PCs out there in the world that can’t be upgraded to Windows 11 officially. While most could be upgraded by bypassing Microsoft’s artificially introduced system requirements, only a small fraction will because of the technical process that is involved and the consequences.

Another 500 million PCs that run Windows 10 can be upgraded, but have not yet. That leaves about 500 million PCs that run Windows 11 already, according to Dell.

However, this is not the only bombshell that Clarke dropped during the call. He also revealed that the transition from Windows 10 to Windows 11 is much slower than the transition from Windows 8 to Windows 10.

The transition is lagging behind, which affects Dell’s growth in the sector. Dell reported a revenue of $12.1 billion for its Client Solutions Group, which bundles commercial client and consumer PC sales. Here, Dell reported a slight uptick in commercial client revenue to $10.1 billion and a declining revenue of $2 billion in consumer PCs.

The Infrastructure Solutions Group made more than up for that though. Its revenue was $14.1 billion, which is a 24 percent increase compared to the last year and the sevenths consecutive quarter with double-digit growth. AI is the main driver of the revenue increase of this group.

To sum it up: Windows 10 users seem to hold on to their PCs, even if they could upgrade them to Windows 10. For now, PCs remain supported with security updates if ESU is enabled for the device.

Now You: Windows 10 or Windows 11, what is your preference? Or something else? Maybe you made the switch to Linux already?

You may have heard that Microsoft is working on a new restore feature for Windows 11 called Point-in-time Restore.

The backup feature in a sentence: It allows Windows admins to restore the exact previous state of a Windows PC.

The main focus is to offer fast restores to a previous system state to allow the quickest recovery possible using integrated options.

The biggest different to System Restore, therefore, is that it creates a snapshot of the entire Windows system and not just some files and setting, like System Restore.

While that sounds like a great addition to Windows and could make some backup apps unnecessary, this is not the case entirely, as there are downsides to this as well.

Probably the biggest letdown is that it is capped to 72 hours. Means, it won’t help if the issue occurred before that period and was not noticed until then. Microsoft says that this is the maximum and that restore states will be deleted after being kept for the maximum.

The restore points may also be deleted in other circumstances, mostly when storage that is reserved for the restoration feature is reaching the set maximum size or when the device itself is running low on disk space.

Windows 11 creates a restore point every 24 hours by default. Here is a table that shows the main differences between Point-in-time Restore and System Restore, according to Microsoft.

Good news is that Point-in-time restore runs locally and while you do need to make sure that enough storage space is available, it could finally be a Windows feature that most Windows 11 users have nothing against.

However, it won’t replace traditional backup software, as these allow you to keep copies indefinitely, something that Point-in-time Restore does not seem to support and probably won’t ever.

Windows users who use BitLocker to encrypt their data either willingly or unknowingly may have run into a BitLocker related issue several times in the past.

It is unclear when it all started, but the essence of the bug was always the same: affected Windows PCs would boot into BitLocker Recovery Mode after installation of an update that caused the issue.

The problem here is that to get out of the mode, users needed the recovery key, which many probably did not really know. While it is easy to look it up online, at least when a user uses a Microsoft account to sign in, it still was a hassle in the best case.

Microsoft confirmed another BitLocker Recovery issue on the Microsoft 365 admin center, but not yet as a known issue for regular users who do not have access to the admin portal.

The issue affects the following Windows versions:

• Windows 10, version 22H2
• Windows 11, version 24H2
• Windows 11, version 25H2

The systems are affected, if the October 2025 security updates are installed on the machines.

Microsoft says that the issue affects Windows PCs with Intel processors and Modern Standby mostly. Still, other systems may also be affected.

As usually, Windows users may resolve the issue by entering the BitLocker recovery key when prompted for it.

Closing Words

Microsoft seems to have a hard time fixing the BitLocker bug for good, as it reappeared several times, including in May of 2025 when Microsoft issued another warning about the problem.

The integration of Microsoft Bing, or any other online search tool for that matter, in Windows Search is an abomination. The main idea is to run a search online if Windows can’t find anything locally or at least give you the option to run the search.

I’d argue that the vast majority of Windows users does not want this. When you run a search locally, you expect local results. Also, a web browser is just a click away and the more appropriate vessel for running searches online.

Recently I noticed that if you are too fast when the system boots, your searches may end up opening Bing in Microsoft Edge, even if there is a local match. It happens only when you open Start right after the system has booted, start typing and press the Enter-key.

Anyway, it is highly recommended to block Bing entirely in Windows Search, unless you are one of the few users who finds this useful actually (I have yet to meet a single user who does though, let me know..).

Here is how you can end Bing in Windows Search in a matter of seconds (thanks Henk):

1. Open the Start menu on the Windows machine.
2. Type Powershell.
3. Select “run as administrator” to open an elevated PowerShell window.
4. Paste the following code: Set-ItemProperty -Path “HKCU:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Search” -Name “BingSearchEnabled” -Value 0 -Type DWord
5. Press the Enter-key to run it.

That is all there is to it. In case you wonder, this adds the Dword BingSearchEnabled to the Registry. Note that you can add the information manually as well using the Registry Editor, or create a Registry file if you prefer that way.

You can undo the change at any time by setting the value to 1 or deleting the key. I doubt anyone would, but it may happen that Microsoft accidentally resets this. You will notice right away though, as searches may include online content in that case again.

Now You: Do you use the online search feature of Windows Search? Or do you disable it / ignore it instead? Feel free to leave a comment down below.