Is Win 10 the Last Version of Windows?

As Microsoft made clear last year by skipping Windows 9 when going from Windows 8 to Windows 10, Windows version numbers are an arbitrary thing.

That's why all this talk about Windows 10, the upcoming version of Microsoft's operating system, being the "last version of Windows" is a "nothing to see here" moment.

Many of us Microsoft watchers had been saying that Threshold (Windows 10) would be the last major version of Windows for months, if not a year. (Windows 10 is due to start rolling out around the middle of the year.) Microsoft Developer Evangelist Jerry Nixon said the same thing last week at Ignite in a session titled "Tiles, Notifications and Action Center."

Cue the headlines claiming that Microsoft has now officially declared Windows 10 the end of the Windows trail.

As those who've been paying attention know, Windows 10 technically isn't the last Windows release. It might or might not be the last Windows release granted a new version number. But that's basically a branding decision.