Microsoft will not extend Windows 7 Extended Security Updates. Server gets another year

Microsoft’s popular Windows 7 operating system reached the end of its support life cycle in January 2020. The company released ESU, Extended Security Updates, for Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 at the same time. Officially available only to companies and business customers, ESU guaranteed a support extension of up to three years.

January 2022 marks the end of ESU’s second year for Windows 7, and the year after will be the last. Microsoft announced this week that it will not extend the ESU program for Windows 7 after January 2023. Organizations and businesses that still use Windows 7 devices will no longer receive updates for the operating system after January 2023.

For Windows 7 SP1 and Windows 7 Professional for embedded systems, the Extended Security Update (ESU) program will enter its third and final year of extended support beginning February 8, 2022, and ending January 10, 2023.

For Server, things are a bit different. Windows Server 2008 products will receive an extension, for one year, according to Microsoft.

For Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1, Windows Server 2008 SP2, Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 for Embedded Systems, and Windows Server 2008 SP2 for Embedded Systems if running on Microsoft Azure, ESU will have an additional year of extended support available starting February 14 2023, through January 9, 2024.

It’s unclear at this time if the price of a 4-year ESU subscription will double again. When Microsoft launched ESU, it revealed that its price would double every year. The ESU cost for Windows 7 Professional is $ 200 per device in the third year, for Windows 7 Enterprise $ 100 per device in the third year.

Enterprise Edition costs for ESU are also the costs that Windows Server customers have to pay to extend support for a server product. Microsoft did not disclose whether it plans to double the price again in the fourth year; this would reach $ 200 for the fourth year if true.

Closing words

Support for Windows 7 ends on January 10, 2023, and there appears to be no option to extend support. While Microsoft has occasionally released security updates for out of support devices in the past, there is no guarantee that it will do so for Windows 7. Third-party options, such as the one provided by 0Patch, may be worth seeing if support needs to be extended. .

Now you: What version of Windows are you running? (via Dr. Windows)

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