You will not be able install Valve’s Steam store, EA’s Origin, Blizzard’s Battlenet or any game distributed on disc or download from outside the Windows Store, however, which will severely limit the selection of games available for Windows 10 S. You can play any game that can be installed from the Windows Store, which includes both mobile games and AAA games – mainly from Microsoft’s game studios – such as Forza Horizon 3 and Gears of War 4, plus Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare. That includes Apple’s iTunes, Google’s Chrome browser and the full versions of Adobe’s Acrobat, Photoshop and the rest of the Creative Suite – or anything else that’s installed via the traditional Windows 7 or earlier way. Which apps won’t Windows 10 S be able to run?Īny apps that are not currently available in the Windows Store will not be able to be installed or run. That will soon include the full Microsoft Office suite and Spotify, while Slack, Evernote, Netflix, Facebook, Adobe Photoshop Elements and many others are already available. Photograph: Samuel Gibbs/The GuardianĪnything downloaded from the Microsoft Windows Store will run on Windows 10 S, which has thousands of applications available, including free, paid and trial versions of software. Which apps will run on Windows 10 S?Īnything downloaded from the Microsoft Windows Store will run on Windows 10 S. It will also receive the same updates at the same time as other versions of Windows 10. Windows 10 S will also come with Microsoft’s BitLocker encryption system for securing your files in case of theft, which some versions of Windows 10 Home do not have available.

Every other version of Windows 10 has the option to install applications from third-party sites and stores, as has the majority of versions of Windows before it. The big difference between Windows 10 S and any other version of Windows 10 is that 10 S can only run applications downloaded from the Windows Store. How is it different from Windows 10 Home or Pro? Windows 10 S will boot 15 seconds faster than a comparable machine running Windows 10 Pro with the same profile and apps installed, and it will run as fast on day 1,000 as it does on day one, Microsoft says. Photograph: MicrosoftĪccording to Microsoft the “S” doesn’t stand for anything in particular, but the company says Windows 10 S is streamlined for simplicity, security and speed.

Windows 10 pro