Updates · 4 min read
Windows 10: Your Extra Year Is Up – What Now?
Ross Marshall
Founder & Director, IT Covered · 15 October 2025 · Updated 21 October 2026
Windows 10 officially reached end of support in October 2025. Since then, the only way to keep it patched has been Microsoft's Extended Security Updates (ESU) programme — and for businesses, Year 1 of that programme finished on 13 October 2026.
If your business PCs are still on Windows 10, here's where you stand.
What Actually Changed This Month
ESU for businesses is sold one year at a time. Year 1 covered October 2025 to 13 October 2026. Year 2 runs from 14 October 2026 to 12 October 2027, and it doesn't renew on its own — you have to buy it and activate it on each device.
If nobody did that, your Windows 10 machines stopped receiving security fixes last week. They'll keep working normally, which is exactly the problem: nothing looks wrong, but every new vulnerability found from now on stays open.
"But I Read Microsoft Extended It to 2027?"
You probably did. In June 2026 Microsoft extended the free consumer ESU scheme to October 2027. That's for home PCs signed into a personal Microsoft account. It isn't licensed for business use, so it isn't an option for your company devices.
What Year 2 Costs
Microsoft's list price for business ESU doubles each year: roughly $61 per device for Year 1, $122 for Year 2 and $244 for Year 3 (UK prices vary by supplier). The payments are also cumulative — if you skipped Year 1, you have to pay for it to get Year 2.
For a ten-PC office, that's around £900 this year just to stand still (more if you need to back-pay Year 1), on machines that are already at least four or five years old.
Why It Matters Beyond Security
- Cyber Essentials: unsupported software is an automatic fail. Devices covered by active ESU and kept up to date are generally treated as supported, but devices that have lapsed are not.
- Insurance: many cyber insurance policies expect supported, patched systems. A claim involving an unpatched Windows 10 PC is a conversation you don't want to have.
- Software: more apps and browsers are dropping Windows 10 support, so problems will creep in over the next year.
What We Recommend
- Find out exactly what you've got. List every Windows 10 device and check whether it can run Windows 11. Many can upgrade for free.
- Upgrade what can be upgraded. Moving a compatible PC to Windows 11 is usually quicker and cheaper than a year of ESU.
- Replace what can't. Budget for new devices now rather than paying rising ESU fees on old ones.
- Use Year 2 ESU only as a bridge. If one specialist machine can't move yet, cover it with ESU while you plan its replacement — not the whole office.
How We Can Help
We'll check every device, tell you which can upgrade and which need replacing, and handle the move with minimal disruption. If you need ESU for a handful of machines in the meantime, we can arrange that too.
Book a free IT audit and we'll give you a clear, plain-English plan — and a fixed price.
Written by
Ross Marshall
Founder & Director, IT Covered
Ross has over a decade of hands-on IT experience, from engineering to IT Director level. He founded IT Covered to give businesses the proactive, jargon-free IT support they deserve.
