Happy 10 Year Anniversay Windows 10 Mobille - RIP

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Windows 10 Mobile was released to the general public on March 17, 2026 so this post is about three weeks late.

 

Anyway, there were high hopes for Windows 10 Mobile when it was released.   However, Microsoft could never could get enough developers, for numerous reasons, to get Windows 10 Mobile solidly into the mobile phone market.  Though in Europe at Windows 10 mobile peak, as i recall it had over 15% market share.    Lack of U.S. market share was Windows 10 mobile's undoing.  

I had several Windows 10 mobile phones and overall I like the OS.   Not too many user opitons but it was a fairly solid OS.   However, as I recall there were problems with the W10 mobile store.   That along with lack of apps were Windows 10 mobile eventual undoing.  

I would still be using it today if the W10 mobile store still worked and periodic OS security updates were released.  

My favorite W10 mobile phone was the Lumia 950 XL

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I'll start a list. Add as you see fit.

MS's constant undermining of developers.

Controversial tiled UI, even hated by some.

Reports of stores promoting iPhone/Android over WM as comissions were higher.

Google playing hardball with Google apps.

MS executives seen using iPhones instead of WM.

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Windows phones replaceable battery feature in many of the W10 phones was a one of the few real positives with respect to WM.  Android has never switched to that because the Android phone manufacturers want to sell phones and not batteries. 

Another posiive years ahead if its time feature was being able to install several apps including updates at one time.  At that time you could only update and install a single app at a time on Android phones.    That of course has not been the case for awhile.

I do believe that if WM had survived that the UI tile issue would have been fixed for the better

WM store was constantantly having issues.   This definitely hurt the appeal of WM.

Broken updates and updates that broke your WM phone was another issue with WM

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Correction: As pointed out by goretsky  It should have read, Windows 10 Mobile was released to the general public on March 17, 2016 so this post is about three weeks late