Short answer: There is no Windows 13 release date: Microsoft has not announced Windows 13, and no build or ISO exists. The current version is Windows 11 26H2, released September 29, 2026, and Microsoft says Windows 11 keeps getting one feature update every year. There is no Windows 13 release date. Microsoft has not announced Windows 13, has not shown it at any event, and has not shipped a single Insider build with that name. What it did ship in 2026 was more Windows 11: version 26H1 for new Arm PCs in February and version 26H2 for everyone on September 29, 2026. Below I walk through what Microsoft has said on the record, what the real roadmap looks like, why the “Windows 13 LEAKED” videos are bogus, and why waiting for a phantom version is a bad plan. Microsoft has said nothing about Windows 13. As of November 2026, the name appears in no Microsoft roadmap, blog post or release note. The current release is Windows 11, version 26H2 (build 26300 ), available since September 29, 2026. Version 25H2 (build 26200 ) is still supported. 26H1 (build 28000 ) is the odd one: released February 10, 2026, only for new devices, and not offered as an update to existing PCs. Microsoft’s own release page says Windows 11 has an annual feature update cadence, with feature updates in the second half of each year. Every “Windows 13” video or ISO is a mockup, a skinned Windows 11, or malware. If you need Windows now, buy Windows 11: each yearly version gets 24 months of updates on Home and Pro, and the next one is free. What has Microsoft officially said about the Windows 13 release date? Microsoft has said nothing about a Windows 13 release date, because it has not announced Windows 13 at all. Its official channels in 2025 and 2026 covered only Windows 11 feature updates, Copilot+ PCs and AI features. The closest thing to a statement is the Windows 11 release page, which commits to yearly Windows 11 feature updates. Nothing. At all. And that nothing tells you the most. I went through everything I could find: the Windows Blog, Windows Insider announcements, the release health pages on Microsoft Learn, and the keynotes from Build and Ignite. Windows 13 does not show up once. Every communication Microsoft put out in 2025 and 2026 was about Windows 11 updates, Copilot+ silicon or AI agents. Not a single sentence mentions a successor by number. The nearest thing to an official position sits at the top of Microsoft’s Windows 11 release information page : “Windows 11 has an annual feature update cadence. Feature updates are released in the second half of the calendar year.” Read it twice if you need to. It commits to Windows 11 and does not even hint at a next version. Why hammer this? Windows has been a rolling service since 2015, and version numbers stopped meaning much in engineering terms. Shipping a “Windows 13” today would be a branding decision first. Somebody in Redmond marketing would need to greenlight a whole launch story, and so far nobody has. What is the real Windows roadmap for 2026 and 2027? The real Windows roadmap for 2026 and 2027 is Windows 11 only: 26H1 for new Arm devices (February 2026), 26H2 for all PCs (September 29, 2026), and, if Microsoft keeps its stated yearly cadence, another Windows 11 feature update in the second half of 2027. No numbered successor appears anywhere on it. Ignore the rumor blogs. What follows is the public record from Microsoft’s release health pages. Want to double-check your own PC? Press Win+R, type winver , and compare the version with the table. About 26H1, a quick explainer, because the setup is unusual. It ships preinstalled on new devices that started reaching stores in early 2026, led by Snapdragon X2 laptops. Already running Windows 11 on an existing machine? You do not get 26H1, and you cannot install it: Microsoft states it is not offered as an in-place update from 24H2 or 25H2. Its first cumulative update, KB5077179 , arrived the same day it launched. Why bring up 26H1 in a Windows 13 post? Because it shows where the effort goes. Microsoft is now servicing two Windows 11 code lines side by side: one for brand-new silicon and one for every other PC. Supporting both and shipping yearly updates on top is plenty of work. Stacking a brand-new numbered Windows onto that in the same year is not realistic. Windows 13 release date rumors: what leaked, and when? Windows 13 rumors grew out of Windows 12 rumors. Between 2022 and 2024, leaked slides and code strings hinted at a post-Windows 11 release, and blogs predicted Windows 12 for late 2024. Instead Microsoft shipped Windows 11 24H2, then 25H2, 26H1 and 26H2. None of the predicted dates came true. The conversation online has been noisy for years: bad leaks, random analyst takes, wishful thinking. Here is what really happened, in order: 2022: Some Insider builds carried leftover strings that seemed to reference a post-Windows 11 release. Blogs immediately ran “Windows 12 or Windows 13” headlines. Microsoft stayed silent. 2023: A chipmaker slide put “Windows 12” next to a new Snapdragon roadmap, and the codename “Hudson Valley” got attached to the story. Tech blogs ran with it for weeks. Late 2023: Several outlets reported, from unnamed sources, that Windows 12 might arrive in the fall of 2024. October 2024: No Windows 12. Windows 11 24H2 landed on the new Germanium platform instead. Completely different from what the leaks said. September 2025: 25H2 (build 26200 ) went out as an enablement package on top of 24H2. February 10, 2026: 26H1 (build 28000 ) shipped for new devices only. September 29, 2026: 26H2 (build 26300 ) became generally available. November 2026 (now): No 12, no 13. YouTube still cranks out new “concepts” every few weeks. Look at that timeline end to end and the pattern is obvious. Every “leak” over the past few years was either somebody mistaking an internal codename or build number for a retail product name, or somebody inventing a story for views. What does Windows version history tell us about a Windows 13 release date? Windows version history suggests a long wait. Gaps between numbered releases have ranged from three to six years, and Windows 11 itself arrived six years after Windows 10. With Windows 11 still getting yearly updates through 2026 and beyond, a new numbered Windows before 2028 looks very unlikely, and a later date is just as plausible. A few points stand out. The 10 to 11 gap was a full six years, and that was while Microsoft was telling everyone numbered versions were over. Windows 11 turned five in October 2026 and is still Microsoft’s only consumer Windows. A realistic brand-new numbered Windows is unlikely before 2028. Could be 2029 or 2030; nobody outside Microsoft can say. Also remember that Microsoft skipped Windows 9 entirely and went from 8.1 straight to 10. A popular explanation is that old apps checked whether the version name started with “Windows 9” to detect 95 and 98, so a real Windows 9 could have confused them; the other half was pure marketing. Could they skip 13 the same way? Possible. For the step that might bridge 11 and whatever comes next, I have a separate post on the Windows 12 release date question . Why are all the “Windows 13” videos online fake? All “Windows 13” videos online are fake because there is nothing real to show. Microsoft has released no Windows 13 build, ISO or Insider preview, so every clip is a design mockup, an ordinary Windows 11 install with a custom theme, or bait that pushes a malicious “Windows 13 ISO” download. None of them is a leak. People get scammed by this, so I will be direct. Search YouTube for “Windows 13” and you will see hundreds of results: “Windows 13 First Look”, “Leaked Windows 13 Build!”, or the all-caps “INSTALL WINDOWS 13 NOW” kind. Fake, every one. No ISO. No Insider preview. No OEM preview under NDA. If nothing exists, nothing can leak. So whatever is in those videos falls into one of three buckets: Design mockups. A designer builds a Figma file of what they would like Windows 13 to look like, records the screen, and uploads it as a “concept demo”. Harmless, just bait for views. Modified Windows 10 or 11 installs. Take a normal PC, load a custom theme, swap the taskbar with a tool such as StartAllBack, and call it “Windows 13” in the thumbnail. It passes in a screenshot. Underneath, it is Windows 11 with makeup. Malware. This one costs people real money. Sketchy sites host “Windows 13 ISO” downloads, and what actually runs is a malware installer: sometimes a cryptominer, sometimes something worse. Threads from victims show up on the Microsoft Q&A forum regularly. Windows only comes from Microsoft: the Windows Insider Program, Windows Update, the Microsoft Update Catalog, and microsoft.com/software-download. That is the entire list of safe sources. An ISO on Mega, a forum, a Telegram group or anything outside that list? Close the tab. Note: Microsoft never distributes Windows as a torrent, a password-protected ZIP or a “pre-activated” image. If a download needs you to disable antivirus first, it is not Windows. What are the common myths about the Windows 13 release date? The most common myths are that Windows 13 launches in 2026, that a beta is on torrent sites, and that Microsoft confirmed it at a Build conference. None is true. Windows 11 26H2 was the big Windows release of 2026, no beta exists, and no Microsoft keynote has mentioned Windows 13. A huge amount of wrong information floats around this topic. Here are the claims I see again and again, with the real status next to each: The common thread? Weak speculation, fan-run wikis, YouTube clickbait and old 2023 leaks that never panned out. Put any of it next to Microsoft’s actual release pages and none of it survives the comparison. When could the Windows 13 release date realistically be? Realistically, a Windows 13 release date could not come before 2028, and 2029 or later is just as plausible. Microsoft would need public Insider builds many months ahead of any launch, and none exist as of November 2026. It might also never ship under the name “Windows 13” at all. Putting everything above together, here is my year-by-year take: 2026: Over. Microsoft shipped 26H1 and 26H2, and the year ended without a successor. 2027: Very unlikely. A new numbered Windows would need a long public Insider phase first, and the 2026 Insider channels carry Windows 11 builds only. 2028: The first year it becomes thinkable. Possible, not confirmed by anything. 2029 or later: Just as plausible. Windows 11 keeps selling and keeps updating, so why rush a replacement? Maybe never called Windows 13: a real possibility. Microsoft could launch a new brand or drop version numbers altogether. Anything online screaming “WINDOWS 13 CONFIRMED” with a specific release window? Invented for clicks. Nobody has that information yet, Microsoft included. What features might a future Windows 13 include? Nobody knows which features a future Windows 13 will include, because no specification exists. Judging by where Microsoft invests today, the next major Windows will typically lean on deeper AI built into the shell, stronger Arm support, more cloud integration and possibly a higher hardware floor tied to NPUs. Treat every item below as an educated guess. This matters if you are building or buying a PC right now and want it to clear the next bar: AI woven through the OS, not bolted on. Copilot today is largely an app plus features scattered through Windows 11. A new version would almost have to integrate AI directly into the shell, search and settings. Arm as a first-class target. The device-only 26H1 release already shows the direction: new Arm silicon gets its own Windows build first. In a future Windows, Arm and x64 would likely sit side by side as equals. A refreshed shell. The Windows 11 taskbar and Start menu drew plenty of criticism and keep getting reworked. Expect another attempt, and more old plumbing cleaned out. A higher hardware floor. Windows 11 introduced TPM 2.0 and a Secure Boot capable PC as minimums. Copilot+ PCs already need an NPU with 40+ TOPS. Whether that becomes a baseline requirement is pure speculation, but it is the obvious candidate.

Cloud first, local second. Setup already pushes OneDrive and a Microsoft account. A future version would most likely push them further. A new platform codename. 24H2 was built on Germanium. A real version jump would usually get a new platform generation and codename. All of that is guessing. There is literally no Windows 13 spec sheet. Do not quote me in 2029 when half this list turns out wrong. How much will Windows 13 cost? Windows 13 has no price, because it has not been announced. Microsoft cannot price a product that does not exist. History gives some hints, though: retail Windows pricing has barely moved between Windows 10 and Windows 11, upgrades from the previous version were free on eligible hardware, and new PCs come with Windows preinstalled. Free in-place upgrades became the default with Windows 10. If Microsoft suddenly charged Windows 11 users to move to a successor, the internet would lose its mind. My money is on the same playbook: if your hardware passes the check, the upgrade costs nothing; if not, you buy a new machine with the new Windows on it. Either way, the license you buy today is not wasted. A genuine Windows 11 key activates the same way through Microsoft’s servers, gets every yearly update, and a digital license tied to your hardware has carried over to the next free upgrade in the past. Should you buy Windows 11 now or wait for Windows 13? Buy Windows 11 now. Windows 13 has no release date and may never ship under that name, while Windows 11 gets free yearly feature updates, and each one is supported for 24 months on Home and Pro. Windows 10 support already ended on October 14, 2025, so waiting on an old system means running it on borrowed time. This is the question most people searching for the Windows 13 release date really care about. Here is my reasoning. Windows 11 is not a dead end. Version 26H2 alone gets updates on Home and Pro until October 10, 2028, and moving to the next yearly version costs nothing. You are buying into a product that Microsoft keeps developing, not one it is winding down. Still on Windows 10? Free security updates stopped on October 14, 2025. Consumers can enrol in Extended Security Updates, which Microsoft extended in June 2026 to October 12, 2027. That is a bridge, not a plan. The hardware angle matters too. A future Windows, whenever it shows up, will most likely ask more of your PC than Windows 11 does. We saw this movie in 2021, when perfectly good Windows 10 machines were locked out of Windows 11 for lacking TPM 2.0. Waiting years for something that might never ship, might use a different name, and might refuse to install on the PC you own in the meantime is not planning. It is postponing a decision. Better move: get Windows 11, use it for years, and look at the next version when it is real and you know what hardware it needs. Before anything else, confirm your system passes the Windows 11 hardware requirements . Not sure which edition fits? My Windows 11 Home vs Pro comparison lays out the differences that matter in daily use. Need a key? Windows 11 Pro key : genuine license, emailed instantly after payment. How do you check your Windows 11 version and get 26H2? To check your Windows 11 version, press Win+R, type winver and press Enter: the window shows the version (for example 26H2) and the OS build. To move to 26H2, open Settings > Windows Update and install the feature update when it is offered. It is free on any PC already running Windows 11. Press Win+R , type winver , and press Enter . Note the version and the build number (26100 means 24H2, 26200 means 25H2, 26300 means 26H2, 28000 means 26H1). Open Settings > Windows Update and click Check for updates . If a feature update to Windows 11, version 26H2 appears, select Download and install . Plan for a restart, and save open work before you start. Restart when prompted, then run winver again to confirm the new version. Not offered yet? Microsoft rolls feature updates out in stages, so some PCs see them weeks later than others. Turning on Get the latest updates as soon as they’re available in Windows Update usually moves you up the queue. A PC that is still on Windows 10 needs to pass the hardware check first; our guide to Windows 11 vs Windows 10 covers that path. Will Microsoft skip the number 13? Microsoft may well skip the number 13, though nothing confirms it. The company already skipped Windows 9, many brands avoid 13 for superstitious reasons, and Microsoft could also drop version numbers or reuse “Windows 12”. If 13 is skipped, the whole Windows 13 release date question simply disappears. Sounds trivial, but it matters here. Precedent exists: Microsoft went from 8.1 straight to 10. Many airlines have no row 13, plenty of hotels leave the 13th floor off their elevator panels, and some hospitals do the same with room numbers. Triskaidekaphobia influences brand decisions often enough to matter. Microsoft’s brand team has surely thought about this, and what it does will depend on its own market research. Worth pointing out: Microsoft was happy to break its own “last version of Windows” line when it moved from 10 to 11 in 2021. How would I bet on the name of the next major Windows? Rough ranking, gut feeling only: Something without a number at all, or a brand-new name. “Windows 12”, finally shipped. A jump to “Windows 14”. That is a hunch, not data. Would I put money on “Windows 13” being the name? Not as my first pick. Windows 11 vs Windows 13: what would actually change? Since Windows 13 does not exist, any comparison is speculation. The likely changes, judging from Microsoft’s current direction, are a higher hardware floor, Arm on equal footing with x64, AI built into the core of the OS, and a stronger push toward cloud accounts. The Windows 11 column below is fact; the other one is not. Nothing in the Windows 13 column is official. It reads signals from where Microsoft spends its engineering budget today. Directional, not scripture. How can you prepare before the Windows 13 release date is official? You can prepare now by running supported hardware, keeping Windows 11 on the current version, using a genuine license, and auditing old software. Those four steps help whatever the next Windows is called, and none of them depends on Microsoft announcing anything. Here they are in priority order: 1. Buy hardware with headroom. If you are replacing a PC anyway, a recent CPU with a capable NPU is the safest bet for whatever comes next. Still on a machine that fails the Windows 11 check? Start shopping now: upgrading on your own timeline beats being forced by a deadline. 2. Stay current and watch the Insider Program. Install 26H2 when Windows Update offers it. If you are curious, the Windows Insider Program’s Canary and Dev Channels get experimental builds first, and anything real about a successor would appear there before any blog could write about it. 3. Sort out your Windows license. Running cracked Windows or a dodgy KMS activator? Major upgrades often break those setups. A genuine license becomes a digital license tied to your hardware, which is what carried people from Windows 10 to 11 at no cost. A handful of edge cases exist where free Windows 10 and Windows 11 keys are legitimate, and that guide explains them. 4. Audit your software today, not mid-migration. 32-bit apps you depend on? Software built for old .NET Framework versions? Drivers from 2014? They are already on borrowed time. Finding replacements ahead of a migration beats scrambling during one. Still on Windows 10? The upgrade section above shows where to start. Tip: Run winver once a quarter. If it still shows a version whose Home and Pro updates have ended (24H2 on Home or Pro, for example), check Windows Update for the latest feature update. Where should you follow Windows 13 release date news? Follow Windows 13 release date news at the source: Microsoft’s Windows release health pages on Microsoft Learn, the Windows Insider Blog, and the keynotes at Microsoft Build in spring and Microsoft Ignite in November. Any genuine announcement of a new Windows would appear there first, long before it shows up in rumor videos. Microsoft’s Windows 11 release information page on Microsoft Learn. Official versions, builds and end-of-update dates show up here first. The Windows Insider Blog . Build numbers there tell you what is being tested right now. Microsoft Build and Microsoft Ignite . Any significant Windows announcement normally lands at one of these two events. Established tech outlets with long track records on Windows, such as Windows Central, Windows Latest, Neowin and Ars Technica. Read them for analysis, and check Microsoft’s pages for facts. Headlines shouting “Windows 13 release date CONFIRMED” with a specific date? Do not click. Nobody serious has that information, because it does not exist yet. Which sources did we check for this Windows 13 article? We checked every date on this page against Microsoft’s own pages, mainly the Windows 11 release information page and the Windows lifecycle documentation on Microsoft Learn, as of November 2026. Statements marked as estimates, guesses or speculation are our own reading of the signals, not anything Microsoft has said. Microsoft Learn: Windows 11 release information (versions, builds, availability and end-of-update dates for 24H2, 25H2, 26H1 and 26H2). Microsoft Learn: Windows 11, version 26H1 notes for IT pros (new devices only, no in-place update from 24H2 or 25H2). Microsoft Support: Windows 10 end of support and consumer Extended Security Updates. Microsoft Q&A: recurring user threads on “Windows 13” downloads and availability. Every specific date above comes from those Microsoft sources. Everything flagged as a guess is exactly that. There is no Windows 13 release date. As of November 2026, Microsoft has not announced Windows 13 anywhere. The current release is Windows 11, version 26H2, available since September 29, 2026, and Microsoft describes Windows 11 as having an annual feature update cadence. Not in 2026: the big Windows release of the year was Windows 11 26H2. For 2027 there is no sign of it either. A new numbered Windows would need a long public Insider phase first, and Insider channels currently carry Windows 11 builds only. Microsoft has not confirmed any plans for Windows 13. It skipped Windows 9 in 2015 and could skip 13 too, reuse the Windows 12 name, or drop version numbers. Until Microsoft announces something, any name is a guess. Windows 12 was rumored in 2023 and 2024, but Microsoft never announced it. It kept releasing Windows 11 feature updates instead: 24H2, 25H2, 26H1 for new devices, and 26H2. Neither Windows 12 nor Windows 13 is on Microsoft's public roadmap. Buy Windows 11. It gets free yearly feature updates, and version 26H2 is supported on Home and Pro until October 10, 2028. Waiting for Windows 13 means waiting years for a version that may never launch under that name. No. Every video showing a working Windows 13 desktop is a mockup or a themed Windows 11, and every Windows 13 ISO is fake and often malware. Download Windows only from Microsoft: Windows Update, the Insider Program, the Update Catalog or microsoft.com/software-download. Microsoft has not set one end date for Windows 11. Each yearly version gets 24 months of updates on Home and Pro and 36 months on Enterprise and Education. Staying on the latest version keeps a Windows 11 PC supported. Windows 11, version 26H1 (build 28000) launched on February 10, 2026 for new devices only, such as the first Snapdragon X2 laptops. Microsoft does not offer it as an update from 24H2 or 25H2, so existing PCs move to 26H2 instead. HypestKey Editorial Team We write guides on choosing, activating and troubleshooting Windows and Office licenses. Selling Microsoft licenses since 2020. About us