it's pretty dangerous not to be getting security updates. probably for regular users won't be a big deal. i have a feeling really bad vulnerabilities will be patched even if you don't pay for it just out of a potential PR issue. but i would almost definitely pay this if I were a business who didn't plan on switching to Win 11 soon
on a personal level i don't understand why anyone continues to use windows these days
For what I do, there's very low risk of anything happening. As for why use it at all. I hate dealing with linux bullshit and mac is intolerably locked down. Windows for better or worse is still the middle ground.
there was a vulernability on the iphone a while back where someone would send you a specific hindu character and it would crash the OS. it can get you no matter what you do really, use or business. the difference is a business has a lot more to lose.
as for the OS talk..
I use MacOS on my macbook & Linux on my desktop at home. I don't think Mac is intolerably locked down. I have virtually the same experience on both. Mac is a very smooth experience once you set it up how you like. I have the same command line applications, the same config files, the same firefox profile that gets synced in between them, same unix utilities that share folders/files as if they were native, can ssh from one to the other, etc
including windows in that would be a PITA
windows is clunky and the company pushing it is becoming progressively more hostile to its users. apple is greedy but at least with their OS it's not pushy. it's the hardware where they stick the knife and twist in terms of price