Windows 10 coming to Raspberry Pi 2, developers can use it for free
Windows 10 Coming to Raspberry Pi 2 — This blog was written by Kevin Dallas, General Manager, Windows IoT Group. — Today the Raspberry Pi Foundation announced the retail availability of their new board, the Raspberry Pi 2.
Context & Ripple Effects
With the Windows 10 IoT Core line still months from a shipping build, Microsoft's Windows IoT Group under Kevin Dallas is using the Raspberry Pi Foundation's retail launch of the Pi 2 to plant Windows in the maker market at zero license cost. The free-developer offer turns a $35-class ARM board into a supported Windows 10 target.
The follow-through came fast: after this announcement, Microsoft moved through an April preview to the public release of Windows 10 IoT Core that summer, adding the MinnowBoard Max alongside the Pi 2 — evidence the free-board strategy was a deliberate beachhead rather than a one-off gesture.
First-order effects
- Raspberry Pi 2 buyers get Windows 10 support at no license fee on day one of the board's availability, making the new hardware a dual-platform device out of the box.
- Microsoft's Windows IoT Group gains a developer funnel into hobbyist and embedded projects that previously had no path onto Windows.
Second-order effects
- Rival maker boards and microcontroller ecosystems — including the Arduino devices Microsoft itself later targeted with the same IoT Core build — must now compete against a free mainstream OS option.
- Board vendors like MinnowBoard gain a shared Windows platform with the Pi 2, letting tooling investment spread across multiple ARM and x86 targets instead of locking into one.
Third-order effects
- If the free-license model holds, low-cost ARM boards evolve from Linux-only hobby kits into general-purpose computing products — the trajectory visible later in the Foundation's own lineup, from the WiFi-equipped Zero W to the keyboard-integrated Raspberry Pi 400.
- Embedded software economics shift toward OS vendors giving away runtime licenses to win device mindshare, monetizing the ecosystem rather than the copy.
The trend: Microsoft's Windows strategy is expanding from paid PC licenses to freely licensed builds on commodity ARM boards, betting that the maker and IoT segment becomes the next installed base.