Windows just fell below 60% market share for the first time ever, the same month Linux hit a yearly high. Here’s the full breakdown.

Windows just had its worst month on record. StatCounter’s newly published numbers for June 2026 put worldwide desktop market share for Windows at 56.61%, the first time it has ever fallen below 60% in the history of the dataset. Linux closed the same month at 4.36%, its highest number in a year. The r/linux crowd found the chart within hours, and the thread that followed was half celebration, half cross examination.

Here’s what the data actually says, what it probably doesn’t say, and why the comments didn’t believe it for a second.

  • ekZepp@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
    14·
    15 hours ago

    A few things can cause that:

    • Browsers that now block operating system fingerprinting by default, a privacy feature several major browsers have quietly shipped in the last couple of years (Librewolf and Helium browser do that)
    • Bot and AI scraper traffic that doesn’t identify itself the way a normal desktop browser would
    • Locked down corporate or government machines with identifying headers stripped out
    • Modified or anonymized versions of Windows that don’t report themselves correctly