Although Windows 8 has been steadily building momentum all year, the latest numbers from Net Applications show that its growth rate has stalled over the last month. Overall, Net Applications found that Windows 8 was on 5.4% of all desktop computers in July, up from 5.1% of all desktops in June. However, this is the slowest adoption growth rate that Windows 8 has had in months, as its growth by 0.3 percentage points is half the growth rate that the platform saw between May and June. Windows 8 adoption also grew by 0.5 percentage points between April and May, by 0.6 percentage points between March and April and by 0.5 percentage points between February and March. It will be interesting to see if growth picks up again once Microsoft releases Windows 8.1, which will add a boot-to-desktop mode and a variation of the Start button, later this year.

Prior to joining BGR as News Editor, Brad Reed spent five years covering the wireless industry for Network World. His first smartphone was a BlackBerry but he has since become a loyal Android user.