Windows 8 was launched in October 2012 with much fanfare, but in the end, this proved to be just another flop in Microsoft's history. Often referred to as “the second Vista,” Windows 8 will reach end of support next week on Tuesday, so all users who are still running it must upgrade to 8.1 as soon as possible.

Although it sounds weird to see a Windows version discontinued after only three years, it actually makes sense because Microsoft considers Windows 8.1 a service pack. So it applies the same strategy as in the case of Windows 7, which got its very own service pack too.

Windows 8.1 is offered free of charge to everyone on Windows 8, so the upgrade can be performed at any time by simply downloading the files from Microsoft's servers. If you do that, support is automatically guaranteed until January 10, 2023, the date when Microsoft end extended support (mainstream support ends on January 9, 2018).

The Windows 10 upgrade

At the same time, once you install Windows 8.1, you have another option and can upgrade to Windows 10, also free of charge and also with just a few clicks. Windows 10 will receive support until October 14, 2025, with mainstream support ending on October 13, 2020.

The good news is that, at this point, only a few users are still on Windows 8, with third-party statistics showing that the operating system launched in 2012 is only running on some 2 percent of the PCs across the world.

This means that it shouldn't take too long until everyone updates to Windows 8.1, but the biggest problem here is to make people aware of the end of support date. Microsoft isn't yet showing any EOL notifications on Windows 8, but the company could start doing this in order to make sure that everyone stays secure.

January 12, 2016, will be the last time Windows 8 receives security patches from Microsoft.