Race to develop applications to support data transfer from Windows 10 to Linux

The PC market is about to undergo a global shift later this year. Microsoft is set to end support for Windows 10 on October 14, 2025. And it's predicted that hundreds of millions of PCs will be stuck on that version. Users who can't upgrade to Windows 11, at least by official means, will have to look for alternatives.

If you ask Microsoft, chances are they'll point you toward a new Windows 11 PC, specifically the Copilot+ PC, but Linux is an option too.

In January, ESET became one of the first companies to recommend Linux for non-upgradable systems. More recently, in May, an 'Endof10' project emerged that aims to teach uninitiated users how to install Linux. The project is backed by Linux (KDE) itself and is an attempt to lure users into the open source world. It later added how Plasma can bring a sense of familiarity to Windows PC users. LibreOffice joined in a bit later, outlining the 'true cost' of staying on Windows (11) in a detailed blog post.

In addition, the 'End of Windows 10 toolkit' was also released by The Restart Project a while ago to guide community repair groups about the upcoming big change, when millions of systems may no longer be supported.

Apart from organizations, individual users are also looking to contribute and help affected users cope with the situation.

TechnoPorg, a student at the University of Waterloo, has released an interesting new utility that can transfer Windows 10 files and settings to Linux. Still in beta, the tool is called Operese and is written in Rust. The utility takes users from Windows 10 to Kubuntu, an Ubuntu-based Linux distribution that uses the KDE Plasma desktop environment.

This is actually a useful feature, as most non-tech savvy users probably wouldn't be able to easily do this on their own, without an automated app like this to assist.

The author of this tool notes that the reason they chose this distro is because of its overall stability and good third-party driver support. In the future, the author says they plan to add more program settings and migrations, UEFI support, better multi-user support, and more.

As mentioned above, the app is still in development so you probably shouldn't use it right away, at least not with real data. However, you can try it on a virtual machine to experience it.

Marvin Fry

Update 01 August 2025