What the survey says
Windows 365 is used by 81% of respondents, Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD) by 63%, Citrix DaaS by 44% and Omnissa Horizon by 26%. Looking ahead, 73% plan to standardize on Windows 365, AVD or both, and 94% include Microsoft EUC technologies in their long-term strategy. Nerdio's own report page puts the 94% figure as "94%+".
Redmondmag also reports on Intune. More than 85% of respondents called it essential or very important to their long-term plans, and 98% rated it at least important. Those Intune numbers appear in Redmondmag's account, not in the Nerdio release.
These usage figures overlap. Respondents can run several platforms at once, so the percentages should not be read as market share.
Multi-platform is the norm
71% of organizations operate two or more desktop virtualization or cloud desktop platforms simultaneously, and 34% operate three or more. Redmondmag says organizations with large Citrix or Omnissa estates are adding Microsoft services rather than waiting for a formal migration to finish.
On long-term plans:
- 43% intend to use both Windows 365 and AVD for different workloads.
- Another 21% expect to run Windows Cloud alongside other EUC platforms over the long term.
The practical point is that "Microsoft-centric" does not mean "single-platform". Adding Windows 365 to a Citrix shop means the old platform and the new one both need patching, monitoring, identity integration and support.
The cloud shift is gradual
Today, 46% run hybrid environments spanning cloud and on-premises infrastructure, while only 11% are fully cloud-based. Over the next 12 to 24 months, respondents expect:
- Primarily cloud-based environments to rise to 33%.
- Fully cloud-based environments to more than double, to 23%.
Redmondmag also reports that 24% already describe themselves as primarily cloud-based. These are expectations, not observed outcomes. The public material doesn't say how "primarily" differs from "fully" cloud-based.
Complexity is the main obstacle
The most-cited barrier to modernization is managing a mix of legacy on-premises and cloud EUC environments, at 47%. The other barriers were:
- Operational complexity and management overhead, at 45%.
- Cloud migration and operational skills gaps, at 42%.
- Application and workload dependencies, at 36%.
Pricing and licensing pressure is a major trigger. 63% say licensing and pricing changes accelerated their modernization or became a primary driver, up from 34% two to three years ago. Once organizations commit, cost is not the main motive. The leading drivers were:
- Modernizing legacy environments, at 50%.
- Automation and operational consistency, at 47%.
- Security and compliance, at 47%.
- Leveraging existing Microsoft investments, at 47% (Redmondmag).
- Cost optimization, at 30%.
- Vendor licensing or platform changes, at 15% (Redmondmag).
The Nerdio release also says automation and AI-assisted operations rank as the top long-term modernization priority. Simplifying EUC operations ranks second, and governance, security and consistency third.
How to read it
The sample. The survey covers 175 decision-makers at organizations with at least 1,000 employees. The public materials don't give field dates, geography, weighting or margins of error. It is a snapshot of one vendor's survey pool, not a census of enterprises.
The framing. Nerdio's pitch is that operating the estate matters more than choosing the platform. That is also what its products address. Nerdio's executive Scott Manchester says "Selecting the platform has become the easy part." That is a vendor's view, though it matches what many admins report.
The details are a mixed picture. Licensing pressure from vendors such as Citrix and Omnissa gets people moving. Once they're moving, operations matter more than price. That is a plausible story, but the survey records stated motivations. It doesn't show that modernization saves money or improves security.
What admins can take from it
The survey is not a migration playbook, and it offers no product configurations. The supportable lessons are about planning:
- Budget for parallel running. Count the cost of operating old and new platforms together, not only the destination.
- Inventory application dependencies early. At 36%, they were cited less often than other barriers, but they are the kind of problem that stalls individual workloads.
- Treat skills as a project risk. 42% cite skills gaps.
- Standardize management where you can. Intune was rated as important by nearly all respondents. A single policy and endpoint-management layer can reduce the sprawl of running multiple platforms.
- Make governance part of the design. Security, compliance and consistency ranked among the top drivers.
The overall picture: Microsoft is in most plans, but the migration doesn't end the work. For many IT teams, the harder job starts once two or three platforms are running side by side.