Windows 7 Finally Tops Windows XP in the U.S.

It’s been 18 months since Windows 7 hit retail availability and Microsoft will this week be celebrating the fact that it’s finally the most popular OS in the United States.

Thanks to low confidence in Windows Vista, many Windows users opted not to update from Windows XP, which meant the 10-year-old OS remained on top. However, according to statistics from StatCounter (via Royal Pingdom), Windows XP has finally been dethroned.

As of April, Windows XP accounts for 31.56 percent of the market, while the newer Windows 7 accounts for 31.71 percent. When Windows 7 launched, Windows XP accounted for nearly 50 percent of the market while Vista accounted for over 35 percent. Vista has since dropped to 19.07 percent. In fourth place is OS X, with 14.87 percent, while Linux comes in fifth with just .7 percent of the market.

Royal Pingdom reports that, while Windows 7 has surpassed XP in a number of countries (including Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Germany), there’s still a ways to go when it comes to toppling XP as the worldwide King of OSes. Windows XP currently accounts for 46.87 percent of the worldwide market, while Windows 7 follows behind with 31.17 percent.

Windows 7’s success is somewhat overshadowed by this week’s leaks about the upcoming Windows 8. Recent evidence suggests we’ll see an app store integrated into the next iteration of Windows.