Still running Windows 7 or 8? Prepare for an Epic fail – Epic Games Store follows Steam and drops support for older operating systems

Windows 10 32-bit users are also left out in the cold, but not quite yet…

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.

TheEpic Games Storehas followed in the footsteps ofSteamin dropping support forMicrosoft’s desktopoperating systemswhich are older thanWindows 10– although this hasn’t happened quite yet.

Epic gave notice in anannouncementthat support forWindows 7andWindows 8(or 8.1) will cease from June 2024, so just over two months’ time. Note thatWindows 1032-bit will also be dropped, but not the 64-bit version of the OS that the vast majority of folks run. There’s no 32-bit version ofWindows 11, of course.

So, support from June will be limited to Windows 10 64-bit andWindows 11- and for macOS, version 10.13 or newer ofApple’s OS.

As mentioned, Epic is a bit later than Valve in closing down support for these older operating systems, becauseSteam enacted this measure at the start of 2024. As you might expect, there weren’t many PC gamers that were affected, going by Valve’s stats – fewer than 1% of Steam users had Windows 7/8 installed at the time. And the same is likely true for theEpic GamesStore.

Analysis: Time to upgrade?

For the small niche of gamers who will be hit by this move, this will obviously be somewhat disappointing. Mind you, when June rolls around, this doesn’t mean you won’t be able to use the Epic Games Store at all. It’ll still work, it just won’t get any updates going forward, or be supported in any way. This means that after a while, bits of functionality might fail and the launcher will eventually probably start to misfire or stop working entirely.

Naturally, without updates, you’ll also be open to any vulnerabilities in Epic’s client, but then if you’re still running Windows 7 or 8, that’ll be the least of your worries – the exploits open to leverage in those systems will be far more worrying in nature, of course.

And that’s exactly why you shouldn’t be running Windows 7 or 8 any longer, anyway. It’s time to upgrade, one way or another – by which we mean make the move to Windows 10 (orWindows 11, if your PC spec is up to it), or take the obvious alternate route, a Linux distro (there aresome solid Windows-like choices out there, after all).

Get the best Black Friday deals direct to your inbox, plus news, reviews, and more.

Sign up to be the first to know about unmissable Black Friday deals on top tech, plus get all your favorite TechRadar content.

What about Windows 10 32-bit users? Well, Microsoft does still support them, but there are very few of these folks out there now (certainly in the gaming world – Steam’s hardware survey doesn’t even list Windows 10 32-bit anymore, and hasn’t for a long time).

ViaNeowin

You might also like

Darren is a freelancer writing news and features for TechRadar (and occasionally T3) across a broad range of computing topics including CPUs, GPUs, various other hardware, VPNs, antivirus and more. He has written about tech for the best part of three decades, and writes books in his spare time (his debut novel - ‘I Know What You Did Last Supper’ - was published by Hachette UK in 2013).

Windows 11’s Paint and Notepad apps are getting smart new AI features – though one of the best will be for Copilot+ PCs only

Windows 11 24H2 misery continues, as Microsoft’s buggy update is now breaking printers – especially on Copilot+ PCs

Target kicks off its Black Friday sale with deals on TVs, toys, iPads, air fryers and more