Windows 11 is now available to more compatible devices

On October 5, 2021, Microsoft launched Windows 11 and started rolling out the latest operating systems for eligible devices that meet minimum hardware requirements. Initially, Microsoft offered Windows 11 for computers with newer hardware, leaving older, yet compatible, PCs to receive the upgrade later. After three weeks of the slow initial rollout, Windows 11 managed to cut off almost 5% of the global Windows 10 market, matching the pace of Windows 10 back in 2015. Now Microsoft is ready to step on it and deliver Windows 11 to more computers with compatible hardware.

On the official Windows 11 documentation (Windows 11 known issues and notifications), Microsoft published a status update, notifying users about the increased availability of Windows 11. Microsoft says their data from the initial rollout and "the latest generation machine learning model" allowed the company to offer Windows 11 via Windows Update to more customers.

Another contributing factor is the fact that Microsoft fixed almost all known issues in Windows 11. The first Patch Tuesday and subsequent "C-Update" fixed bugs with printers, compatibility problems with apps that use non-ASCII characters in the registry keys, performance degradation on AMD systems, and Internet slowdowns on systems with Intel Killer network cards.

You can go to Windows Settings > Update & Security > Windows Update and check whether your computer is eligible to update right away. To get Windows 11 via Windows Update, your computer needs an 8th gen Intel Core or AMD Ryzen 2nd gen CPU with UEFI, SecureBoot, and TPM 2.0. Microsoft also allows clean-installing Windows 11 on unsupported hardware, although it does not guarantee future updates or support.

Microsoft is now rolling out the PC Health Check tool via Windows Update to help users learn whether their systems are compatible with Windows 11 or not. That update is available on Windows 10 21H1, 20H2, and 2004.