Windows 10 Home vs. Pro

Microsoft's offers Windows 10 in two versions: Home and Pro(fessional). It's easy to understand on a conceptual level what this means: Pro is for people to use at work, and Home is for personal machines. But what's the real difference? Let's take a look at Windows 10 Home vs Pro.

Windows 10 Pro Has More Features

The bottom line is Windows 10 Pro offers more than its Home counterpart, which is why it's more expensive. There's nothing Windows 10 Home can do that Pro can't. In fact, they're largely the same operating system.

The difference, then, is based on whether the license you activate is for Home or Pro. You've probably done this before, either when installing Windows, or setting up a new PC for the first time; you reach a point in the process where you enter a 25-character Product ID (license key).

Based on that key, Windows will make a set of features available to you within the OS. The features average users need are present in Home. Pro offers more features, but this refers to built-in functions of Windows, and many of them are tools only system administrators would be interested in.

So the question is, what precisely are these additional things in the Pro version features, and do you need them?

WINDOWS 10 PRO HAS ADDITIONAL SECURITY FEATURES

In addition to the various user account management features, Windows 10 Pro includes Bitlocker, Microsoft's encryption utility. It can secure either the disk with your OS (i.e. the C: drive) or removable media like thumb drives.

While there are other disk encryption tools available, Bitlocker will integrate with your company's infrastructure, meaning your admin can secure your machine without you having to worry about it.

WINDOWS 10 HOME DOESN'T HAVE WINDOWS FUNDAMENTALS

Windows Fundamentals includes some features that have been present in Windows for some time now, going all the way back to when it was originally separated into Pro and Home versions.

The below examples of these have been bumped up to become Pro version "upgrades," or features Home users can't use until they upgrade to Pro.

• Domain Join: The Windows Domain is one of the basic building blocks of business networks, and controls access to network resources such as file drives or printers.
• Azure Active Directory Domain Join, with Single Sign-On to Cloud-Hosted Apps: Remembering your credentials to access the many apps of an enterprise can become burdensome for you, and maintaining all those accounts is difficult for administrators. Single sign-on is a way to maintain one username and password, and use it to authenticate everywhere you need to. Microsoft offers its Active Directory service (running from its own Azure cloud) to allow organizations using Windows 10 Pro to take advantage of this.
• Enterprise Mode Internet Explorer (EMIE): Many web-based business applications were originally built against older versions of Internet Explorer. Rather than having to update to newer browser versions and break their apps, many companies instead keep their employees on these older versions. They may not benefit from the latest and greatest web technology, but the programs they need to do their jobs will work. This feature allows users with newer version of Internet Explorer to load websites and web pages using the engines from these past iterations. Users can then take advantages of better security, and still enjoy compatibility with older company apps.

• Remote Desktop: Remote control of your home computer is an example of a feature that almost any user would love to have. However, the built-in Windows Remote Desktop functionality is limited to Windows Pro users.
• Client Hyper-V: Users must have Windows Pro to use Microsoft's virtual machine solution, Hyper-V. While this is a built-in function, you can replicate with other programs. For example, by using Oracle's VirtualBox to run Ubuntu in Windows.

WINDOWS 10 PRO HAS MANAGEMENT AND DEPLOYMENT FEATURES

There are some Windows 10 Pro advantages that won't be as important to the personal computing enthusiast. Nonetheless, it's worth knowing some of the business-focused functions you'd be paying for if you upgraded to Pro:

• Group Policy: Group Policy allows administrators to limit what users can do using a centralized set of roles. This includes security elements like password complexity, whether they can access network resources, or install applications.
• Enterprise State Roaming with Azure Active Directory: This allows users to synchronize their important settings and application info across devices via Microsoft's Azure cloud. This doesn't include documents and files, but rather how the machine is configured.
• Windows Store for Business: This is similar to the consumer-facing Windows Store, except this one allows business users to make purchases of apps at volume. They can also manage those purchases or subscriptions for all users in the organization.
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