With Windows 7 support ending in just 10 months, Microsoft revealed today that it will begin nagging users to upgrade to Windows 10. Or, as Microsoft calls it, a “courtesy reminder.”

“Beginning next month, if you are a Windows 7 customer, you can expect to see a notification appear on your Windows 7 PC,” Microsoft’s Steve Clark explains. “This is a courtesy reminder that you can expect to see a handful of times in 2019.”

One might naturally wonder how Microsoft could institute such a thing, given the effect that previous nag screens had on its customers and the ensuing bad PR. But Barlow says that the firm is doing this now to be proactive, so that its users can begin preparing for the migration away from Windows 7 early. And Microsoft has at least learned one lesson from the past: Let users decide what they see in Windows.

“These notifications are designed to help provide information only and if you would prefer not to receive them again, you’ll be able to select an option for ‘do not notify me again,’ and we will not send you any further reminders,” he notes.

One thing Clark doesn’t mention is any effort by Microsoft to ease the transition to Windows 10 by making the upgrade free again. There are probably pragmatic reasons for this, among them that most PCs out in the world today still running Windows 7 are probably older and can’t upgrade to Windows 10, or will provide a diminished experience.

And this warning is, of course, for individuals and small businesses only: Microsoft revealed back in January that it will allow its biggest commercial customers to continue paying for Windows 7 support for three years past that system’s January 2020 support expiration. It is not making that same offer to others.

Via Thurrott