Microsoft wants to bring Windows 10 on 1 billion devices by 2017, but the company still has to do baby steps before anything else, so making the operating system available to as many Windows 7 and 8.1 computers as possible is now a priority.

Those who qualify for the free upgrade get Windows 10 in waves and statistics show that despite the somehow limited availability of the OS (some users are still waiting to get the upgrade), its market share is growing really fast in the United States.

Early StatCounter data for the month of August indicate that Windows 10 has already reached a market share of 5.72 percent in the United States, which is enough to become the fourth most used operating system on the desktop in the country.

More users than Windows 8 and XP

Right now, Windows 7 continues to be the leading choice for those using a PC in the United States, so the operating system launched in 2009 currently has a market share of 46.03 percent.

The second is Mac OS X with 17.82 percent, but this isn’t at all surprising because the US is also Apple’s home market and one of the countries where Mac and OS X are both really popular.

Windows 8.1 comes third with a share of 16.32 percent, followed by Windows 10, which managed to overtake both Windows XP and Windows 8 in a little over 20 days on the market.

Windows XP currently powers 4.24 percent of the PCs in America, while Windows 8 dropped to 2.22 percent. Windows Vista has a little bit more users, with its share now at 3.18 percent.

There’s no doubt that these figures will grow fast in the coming weeks, so expect Windows 10 to overtake Windows 8.1 and go after Windows 7 by the end of the year.