Nvidia throws Windows 10 gamers a lifeline with driver support – but time’s up for the popular GTX 1060 GPU, as support runs out in October 2025
- Nvidia has announced that support for GTX 10 series GPUs ends in October 2025
- After that, these graphics cards, including the GTX 1060, will only get security fixes
- It also announced that Windows 10 support will run through to October 2026, mirroring Microsoft’s extended support program for the OS
Nvidia has released a new graphics driver and announced that it’ll soon be drawing the curtain on support for GeForce GTX 10 series GPUs, as well as GTX 900 models – and the end for Windows 10 gamers will follow a year later.
As Ars Technica highlighted, the release notes for driver version 580.88 came with the revelation that graphics cards based on Maxwell and Pascal architecture – meaning GTX 900 and 10 series products – will witness their final driver release in October 2025.
After that, they will only get quarterly security updates to patch them against vulnerabilities, and that’s all. Security patches will finish in October 2028 for these products, too.
If October 2025 rings a bell, that’s because it’s also the month when Microsoft casts aside support for Windows 10, and that’s also wrapped up in this Nvidia announcement.
Team Green said that it’s extending Game Ready Driver support for Windows 10 to October 2026, to mirror the extended support Microsoft is offering consumers who want to stick with the OS, and not upgrade to Windows 11 yet. Or indeed people who may not be able to upgrade to the newer operating system, due to their PC not meeting the hardware requirements.
This move comes as no surprise, as Nvidia already told us back at the start of July that the v580 drivers would be the last to support Maxwell and Pascal graphics cards – we just didn’t know exactly when the cut-off was coming, and now we do.
If you’re affected, what does this mean exactly?
As stated, there are two categories of PC gamers who this affects: those with GTX 10 model GPUs, like the GTX 1060, and those running Windows 10. Further, some folks will be in both camps, no doubt – maybe quite a few.
GTX 10 series graphics cards are still reasonably popular in some cases (whereas GTX 900 products have pretty much dwindled away to nothing). In fact, the GTX 1060 is actually the 12th most popular GPU according to the latest Steam hardware survey – and once reigned supreme – so it’s still seeing a lot of use.
After October 2025, this GPU, along with other 10 series offerings like the 1070 and 1080, will only receive security updates. That means they’ll still be safe to use – patched against any exploits in drivers that may be found by the bad actors out there – but they won’t get support for new games or features.
So, as time rolls on, you’ll find that your trusty GTX 1060 becomes wonkier and less reliable with new games, as its final driver version ages and generally gets more erratic. Note that if you stick with old games, which were catered for before game support was frozen, you should be fine, at least in theory.
As for those on Windows 10, you’ll be okay for another year yet. You’ll still have full driver support through to October 2026, as noted, so you’ll be fine until then. Assuming you keep Windows 10 itself secure, of course – using Microsoft’s offer of extended support, which is now free, with a slight catch.
After October 2026, though, you’ll need to upgrade to Windows 11, or you won’t get new drivers – so no game support, or security patches either – no matter how new your Nvidia GPU is.
At this point, you’re really looking at a Windows 11 upgrade – or a switch to something else entirely – unless Microsoft extends Windows 10 support further for consumers beyond 2026 (which seems unlikely, but could happen). In which case, Nvidia might again mirror the move with its own drivers – given that’s what has happened here – but nothing’s guaranteed by any means.
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