Microsoft officially cancels Windows 10X, its Chrome OS competitor

Microsoft will not bring Windows 10X to the market, the company confirmed on Tuesday. Windows 10X was supposed to be Microsoft’s answer to Google’s Chrome OS, a lightweight operating system that was said to launch first on PCs for schools and enterprise market.

“Instead of bringing a product called Windows 10X to market in 2021 like we originally intended, we are leveraging learnings from our journey thus far and accelerating the integration of key foundational 10X technology into other parts of Windows and products at the company,” confirms John Cable, head of Windows servicing and delivery, in a blog post.

First announced in late 2019, Microsoft said its Windows 10X would run only on dual-screen and foldable PCs, and the operating system would be designed specifically for new types of PCs. To showcase the capabilities of Windows 10X, the company announced a dual-screen Surface Neo device, which it said would be available in the fall of 2020. But, a few months later, the company took a u-turn and announced that Windows 10X will first debut on single-screen devices.

The official response from Microsoft should put all the speculations to rest surrounding the cancellation of Windows 10X. While Windows 10X isn’t coming, Microsoft says it will now “continue to invest in areas where the 10X technology will help meet our customer needs as well as evaluate technology experiences both in software and hardware that will be useful to our customers in the future.” It is said that Microsoft will bring some elements of Windows 10X to Windows 10 with the next big update planned for later this year. The next update for Windows 10 will include new system icons, File Explorer improvements, and much more.

Windows 10X was built entirely on code from a universal Windows codebase called Windows Core OS. Although it never intended to replace Windows 10, Microsoft envisioned a Chrome OS competitor as simpler and more stripped-down than Windows 10.