Steam to end Windows 7 and 8 support by January 2024

Operating system fragmentation has always been an issue for Windows, and while the situation had been mostly resolved thanks to Windows 10 (until Windows 11 was introduced), many users still run much older versions of Microsoft’s OS, including Windows 8 and even Windows 7. Those wanting to play games via Steam however will soon need to upgrade as come the end of the year support for older versions of Windows is officially ceasing.

Making the announcement via their Steam Support page, Valve announced that “As of January 1 2024, Steam will officially stop supporting the Windows 7, Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 operating systems. After that date, the Steam Client will no longer run on those versions of Windows. In order to continue running Steam and any games or other products purchased through Steam, users will need to update to a more recent version of Windows.”

Explaining the reasons behind this decision, Valve continued, “The newest features in Steam rely on an embedded version of Google Chrome, which no longer functions on older versions of Windows. In addition, future versions of Steam will require Windows feature and security updates only present in Windows 10 and above.”

While Windows 10 saw a great deal of adoption, millions of PCs still run much older versions of the software. Fortunately, many of those are unlikely to be gaming PCs and so hopefully this upcoming end of support affects as few people as possible. Still, for Steam users running Windows 7/8 your PC’s days are unfortunately numbered.

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KitGuru says: What OS do you use? Have you updated to Windows 11? What is your favourite version of Windows? Let us know down below.

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