For reluctant guinea pigs —

It looks like Windows 10 Home can now defer updates for 35 days

Change would give Home and Pro users the same deferral range.

A painfully adorable guinea pig sits amidst green grass.
Enlarge / Not every Windows 10 user appreciates being a guinea pig for Windows updates.

The next Windows 10 feature update, version 1903, looks like it's going to give Windows 10 Home users a little more flexibility about when they install updates. All versions of Windows 10 allow for updates to be deferred, waiting a number of days after each update is released before attempting to install it.

Currently in Windows 10 version 1809, Windows 10 Home users are limited to a delay of just seven days. In the latest preview build of Windows 10, however, this has been raised to 35 days (via Reddit). This means that users nervous about being the first to use each new update can wait a little over a month before installing it.

While most Windows updates are problem-free for most people, issues do crop up from time to time. Generally, these are resolved within a week or two of the initial release, with Microsoft either reissuing fixed versions of the patches or sometimes blacklisting particular hardware or software combinations that have proven problematic. The 35-day delay is almost invariably going to be sufficient to let people wait for these bugs to be shaken out.

The change doesn't appear to have any official confirmation, but it is apparent when performing a fresh installation of a preview build and not putting the machine in the Insider Program. Machines in the Insider program have their deferral period capped at seven days, even in the Pro and Enterprise versions of Windows. The latest Windows builds have removed the preview watermark from the desktop, indicating that Microsoft is nearing the final release of 1903. So it seems very likely that this 35-day limit is here to stay.

Channel Ars Technica