First major update to Windows 10, 'Redstone', reportedly coming next year

Windows 10 -- the forthcoming operating system for desktop, mobile, gaming console, and IoT devices -- will hit the shelves this summer. While there is still some time left for it, according to a new report by Neowin’s Brad Sams, the Redmond-based software giant has already started to work on the "next Windows update". Codenamed "Redstone", it is the first major update to Windows 10 and will be released in 2016, ZDNET’s Mary Jo Foley confirms, citing her sources.

We don’t know what exactly this update will add to the operating system, but one thing is pretty evident: Microsoft is gearing up its update cycle. The company is now providing major updates to its operating system on a yearly basis, while also providing security patches on the second Tuesday of every month.

Windows 10 will be the first operating system to be on the fast update cadence, but the company shifted to a faster update cycle with Windows 8. The company released Windows 8 in 2012. The operating system introduced a major graphical overhaul including a Start screen, and tiled Modern UI. The company received a lot of flak, and later released Windows 8.1 -- an improvement over Windows 8 -- in 2013. Last year, the company released Windows 8.1 Update, another yearly update to its desktop operating system.

But things weren’t the same a couple of years ago. Microsoft released Windows 7 in 2009, but it wasn’t until 2011 that the company pushed the first service pack for it. Going further back in time, Windows XP -- which the company released in 2001 -- didn’t receive its first major update until 2003.

Citing her sources, Foley further reports that "Redstone" won’t be Windows 11, or Windows 12 -- basically, a standalone Windows operating system -- and will be a software update. It will be pushed to all Windows 10 users as a regular update -- perhaps every month or so, she reports.

Word is that Redstone will extend Windows 10’s support to more devices -- the devices that won’t make the cut in time to be included in Windows 10 this year. As for the significance of "Redstone" codename, the term comes from Minecraft, a game that Microsoft acquired last year.

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