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Are you sure? Statista has windows at a 71% server market share in 2019: https://www.statista.com/statistics/915085/global-server-share-by-os/ https://www.stati

Are you sure? Statista has windows at a 71% server market share in 2019: https://www.statista.com/statistics/915085/global-server-share-by-os/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/915085/global-server-sha... Edit: Because people seem to think that the numbers are made up, here's some more sources with not quite as high, but similarly dominant numbers: Red Hat: https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/red-hat-continues-lead-linux-server-market https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/red-hat-continues-lead-linux-... - microsoft @ 49% in 2017 t4: https://www.t4.ai/industry/server-operating-system-market-share https://www.t4.ai/industry/server-operating-system-market-sh... - microsoft @ 47% in 2018

sacomo 5y ago
I wonder if this only considers the OS that a server was shipped with? Which is typically nuked as soon as the customer receives it.
- qw3rty01 5y ago
  This may be true for small companies, but larger businesses tend to use windows due to support contracts.
  - dragonwriter 5y ago
    Larger companies have no problems finding people to pay to support Linux, or if they are really large (say, Amazon), supporting it themselves and being who people (including big companies) pay to support and host Linux systems.
  - MobiusHorizons 5y ago
    it all depends on size. some larger (typically older) companies with smaller engineering teams will make the tradeoff you are describing. But the big players today, who manage hundreds of thousands to millions of servers are not going to pay per machine / per core license counts for support. They build and maintain most of their own software for their own needs.
- Symbiote 5y ago
  Servers aren't generally delivered with an unwanted OS, or an unwanted Windows license. If it's going to run Linux, you tick that option when ordering. Or you tick "no OS".
jakeinspace 5y ago
I don't have access to the source, but I literally cannot believe that is true.
- qw3rty01 5y ago
  it says it right in the description, which you don't need a subscription to read > In 2019, the Windows operating system was used on 72.1 percent of servers worldwide, whilst the Linux operating system accounted for 13.6 percent of servers. Compared to 2018, both companies experienced an increase to their overall market share.
  - dragonwriter 5y ago
    I don't think what is described as unbelievable is that the source claims that, but that the claim is true. (And since it describes both “Windows” and “Linux” as “companies” that gained marketshare, I’m somewhat suspicious of their information gathering.) But not being registered with them, I don’t have access to what passes for their detailed source information for that claim.
  - himinlomax 5y ago
    That's just unbelievable on the face of it.
- martinald 5y ago
  There's often dozens of Windows servers installed on site in millions of offices around the world, doing various tasks (email, active directory, file storage, etc). I'm sure if you looked at "servers installed in a data centre" then it would be closer to what you expect. But there are so many servers doing "boring" jobs in cupboards youll never see it totally skews the figures.
  - yakz 5y ago
    But if you looked at “servers installed in a data centre” what you’d discover is that there’s millions of servers in just one building.
kristopolous 5y ago
In the wild at actual data centers I'd gladly bet $10,000 it's actually under 1%. It'd be the easiest $10,000 I'd ever make
- qw3rty01 5y ago
  You'd be losing that bet. Larger datacenters tend to use windows because of microsoft providing support contracts. I don't have access to the full numbers, but I'd bet on the linux side being majority red hat for the same reason.
  - kristopolous 5y ago
    What planet do you live on? Have you ever been to a datacenter? Look at top500, it's literally 0% windows, https://www.top500.org/statistics/list/ https://www.top500.org/statistics/list/ Many of the VPS providers don't even have windows options because the demand is so low it's not even worth offering as a product. Server farm sysadmins I know habitually lament they are rusty in windows whenever it's in front of them because it's completely vanished from their daily experience If this was a survey of companies where the weight of say, a liquor store with a 20 year old beater in the back closet that they'll call a server is 1 vote, and say, all of Amazon is also 1 vote, then maybe you can get that number, but that's basically the only way
    - qw3rty01 5y ago
      top500 is a super computer dataset, it's not really relevant to general server market share you could even look at Red Hat, one of microsoft's competitors, who showed microsoft's market share at 49.6% in 2017: https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/red-hat-continues-lead-linux-server-market https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/red-hat-continues-lead-linux-...
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
      - kristopolous 5y ago
necheffa 5y ago
Are these real numbers or are they counting SMB instances running on commodity hardware and doing other weird junk to play with the stats? Windows isn't even the most used OS on Azure. Certainly large deployments at Google, Facebook, Amazon, etc. accounting for a huge proportion of the population aren't running Windows either.
himinlomax 5y ago
I'm pretty sure any one of Amazon, Google or Facebook has more Linux servers than there are Windows server in the world.
- pjmlp 5y ago
  Where are the numbers if you are so sure?
  - nh2 5y ago
    Google alone had 2.5 million servers in 2016 as per estimate [1], and 0.9 million in 2011 in [2]. So a reasonable guess for today seems > 5 million. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_data_centers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_data_centers [2] https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2011/08/01/report-google-uses-about-900000-servers https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2011/08/01/repo...
    - pjmlp 5y ago
      I am missing the numbers for the rest of the world.

sacomo 5y ago

I wonder if this only considers the OS that a server was shipped with? Which is typically nuked as soon as the customer receives it.

qw3rty01 5y ago
This may be true for small companies, but larger businesses tend to use windows due to support contracts.
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  Larger companies have no problems finding people to pay to support Linux, or if they are really large (say, Amazon), supporting it themselves and being who people (including big companies) pay to support and host Linux systems.
- MobiusHorizons 5y ago
  it all depends on size. some larger (typically older) companies with smaller engineering teams will make the tradeoff you are describing. But the big players today, who manage hundreds of thousands to millions of servers are not going to pay per machine / per core license counts for support. They build and maintain most of their own software for their own needs.
Symbiote 5y ago
Servers aren't generally delivered with an unwanted OS, or an unwanted Windows license. If it's going to run Linux, you tick that option when ordering. Or you tick "no OS".

jakeinspace 5y ago

I don't have access to the source, but I literally cannot believe that is true.

qw3rty01 5y ago
it says it right in the description, which you don't need a subscription to read > In 2019, the Windows operating system was used on 72.1 percent of servers worldwide, whilst the Linux operating system accounted for 13.6 percent of servers. Compared to 2018, both companies experienced an increase to their overall market share.
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  I don't think what is described as unbelievable is that the source claims that, but that the claim is true. (And since it describes both “Windows” and “Linux” as “companies” that gained marketshare, I’m somewhat suspicious of their information gathering.) But not being registered with them, I don’t have access to what passes for their detailed source information for that claim.
- himinlomax 5y ago
  That's just unbelievable on the face of it.
martinald 5y ago
There's often dozens of Windows servers installed on site in millions of offices around the world, doing various tasks (email, active directory, file storage, etc). I'm sure if you looked at "servers installed in a data centre" then it would be closer to what you expect. But there are so many servers doing "boring" jobs in cupboards youll never see it totally skews the figures.
- yakz 5y ago
  But if you looked at “servers installed in a data centre” what you’d discover is that there’s millions of servers in just one building.

kristopolous 5y ago

In the wild at actual data centers I'd gladly bet $10,000 it's actually under 1%. It'd be the easiest $10,000 I'd ever make

qw3rty01 5y ago
You'd be losing that bet. Larger datacenters tend to use windows because of microsoft providing support contracts. I don't have access to the full numbers, but I'd bet on the linux side being majority red hat for the same reason.
- kristopolous 5y ago
  What planet do you live on? Have you ever been to a datacenter? Look at top500, it's literally 0% windows, https://www.top500.org/statistics/list/ https://www.top500.org/statistics/list/ Many of the VPS providers don't even have windows options because the demand is so low it's not even worth offering as a product. Server farm sysadmins I know habitually lament they are rusty in windows whenever it's in front of them because it's completely vanished from their daily experience If this was a survey of companies where the weight of say, a liquor store with a 20 year old beater in the back closet that they'll call a server is 1 vote, and say, all of Amazon is also 1 vote, then maybe you can get that number, but that's basically the only way
  - qw3rty01 5y ago
    top500 is a super computer dataset, it's not really relevant to general server market share you could even look at Red Hat, one of microsoft's competitors, who showed microsoft's market share at 49.6% in 2017: https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/red-hat-continues-lead-linux-server-market https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/red-hat-continues-lead-linux-...
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - kristopolous 5y ago

necheffa 5y ago

Are these real numbers or are they counting SMB instances running on commodity hardware and doing other weird junk to play with the stats? Windows isn't even the most used OS on Azure. Certainly large deployments at Google, Facebook, Amazon, etc. accounting for a huge proportion of the population aren't running Windows either.

himinlomax 5y ago

I'm pretty sure any one of Amazon, Google or Facebook has more Linux servers than there are Windows server in the world.

pjmlp 5y ago
Where are the numbers if you are so sure?
- nh2 5y ago
  Google alone had 2.5 million servers in 2016 as per estimate [1], and 0.9 million in 2011 in [2]. So a reasonable guess for today seems > 5 million. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_data_centers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_data_centers [2] https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2011/08/01/report-google-uses-about-900000-servers https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2011/08/01/repo...
  - pjmlp 5y ago
    I am missing the numbers for the rest of the world.