What is the real version number of Windows 8?

In order to count what the “true” version number of Windows 8 is, we’ve laid out a handy chart with all of the major releases of Windows.  As we’ve pointed out earlier in this article, it is debatable whether some versions should be considered its own version number or be lumped in as a subversion of an existing edition.

Microsoft was not consistent with how it marketed some of its versions.  Windows 98 was marketed as a new version of Windows, even though it was really a subversion of Windows 95.  The same thing is true with Server 2003, even though it was a subversion of XP.  In the opposite direction, Microsoft named Windows NT 3.5, trying to make the public think it was in the same product line as Windows 3.1.

 
Will the real 3.1 please stand up?

So, whenever a break in the rules occurs, we mark the version as a potential increase and count it as a “Version Bump”.  Whenever a version of Windows supports a new hardware architecture, it also gets a “Version Bump”.

We can now calculate the true version of Windows 8.

* = subversion  significant enough or marketed as new OS
** = different hardware architecture 

The chart looks pretty straightforward? Not so fast… read on…