Windows XP and Vista Support Dropped From Steam Starting January 1st

Steam is shifting gears and will drop support for Windows XP and Windows Vista starting January 1st. These operating systems have been supported for a long time now, but it is time to let them go.

Windows XP and Windows Vista users are gradually decreasing in frequency and more are shifting to the modern operating systems like Windows 7, 8 and 10. Valve has decided to finally pull the plug for these old operating systems and won’t support them officially in 2019.

“Starting on January 1 2019, Steam will officially stop supporting the Windows XP and Windows Vista operating systems. This means that after that date the Steam Client will no longer run on those versions of Windows. In order to continue running Steam and any games or other products purchased through Steam, users will need to update to a more recent version of Windows,” said a message posted by Valve that explains the reason behind their decision.

While the support will end, this doesn’t mean Steam will suddenly stop running on them. The functionality will be there but it will be limited. An example given by Valve was “new features such as the new Steam Chat will not be available.”

One of the reasons given was that the platform will “rely on an embedded version of Google Chrome, which no longer functions on older versions of Windows.” In addition, security updates are only released for Windows 7 and above so Valve will have trouble supporting the old operating systems in light of this decision.