Historically, Nikon's software hasn't kept up with operating systems. That was particularly true on the macOS side, where Apple was iterating a new major version every year and Nikon was struggling to even keep older OS versions working. Typically, sometime after Apple had shipped a final release of a new macOS we'd get a communication from HQ saying something like "we're investigating this new version and how it might impact our applications." This, despite the fact that Apple has a pretty open beta program that typically runs for four months or more prior to actual shipment. Nikon's position seemed to be: we'll wait until the new version ships, then do our ISO9000 work after that.
Not as much today. Indeed, now we have the opposite problem: support for older OS versions is being quickly and dramatically dropped. The oldest supported macOS is currently Ventura (13.x), and I believe that is about to shift to Sonoma (14.x).
NX Studio and NX Tether just had updates (partly because there is a new camera they need to support). Windows 10 support has been completely dropped. You get a message if you try to install these products to Windows 10 that it is no longer supported. So things are worse on the Windows side.
Yes, I know that Microsoft is trying to move the world off of Windows 10. But that's not instantly possible, if nothing else for monetary reasons, but also because of how some corporations standardize their deployed machines. By dropping Windows 10 support, Nikon is saying "we won't support you even if you're paying to extend Windows 10 support."
Nikon now seems to be almost caught up to the operating system providers. Nikon only supports the three most recent macOS versions (with a bit of a lag when a new one is launched by Apple), and Windows 11. That's it.
The latest numbers I have available are that about half of Windows users are still on earlier versions of Windows [source: ControlUp]. So, in essence, Nikon is probably cutting off half their Wintel side with these latest NX releases. Meanwhile, on the Macintosh side, the number not on at least Ventura seems to be less than 10% now. So Nikon is currently supporting 90%+ of the Macintosh base, 50%- of the Wintel base. Anyone see a problem with that? ;~) (If you don't, hint: the MacOS worldwide market share is less than 10%.)
When people complain to me about things like Adobe's subscription-based software, they need to be aware of the above: Adobe is not only keeping up with Apple and Microsoft and back supporting deeper, but they're also doing so with camera models, file formats, and more. Progress requires investment.
However, Nikon's modus operandi in how they handle OS support is more trying to minimize a problem than fix it. They're fixing their problem, not the customers'. You really don't want to be doing things that give customers the chance to say "that's it, I'm done." But that's exactly what Nikon did with dropping Windows 10 support.
