Microsoft may be preparing to shut down Skype in the coming months. A hidden line appeared in the code of the latest preview version of the app: “Starting in May, Skype will no longer be available. Continue calling and chatting in Teams,” XDA Developers noted. Further details are still lacking, but Skype’s days are likely numbered.
Image source: skype.com
Skype launched in 2003, and in its heyday, it was a popular VoIP calling and messaging platform. Microsoft acquired Skype for $8.5 billion in 2011 and has tried to integrate it into many of its products, including Windows, Windows Phone, and even Xbox. The company has updated and redesigned Skype several times over the past decade, even forking it to integrate it into the Phone and Messages apps in Windows 10 Mobile and position it as a viable competitor to Apple’s iMessage.
But in recent years, Microsoft has largely abandoned Skype. The company failed to make it truly viable during the pandemic, and it has largely fallen by the wayside in the eyes of consumers. Most people have moved on to more modern platforms like Telegram, WhatsApp, iMessage, and Discord. Microsoft used Skype’s experience to create its popular corporate messaging app Teams, but there are many differences between the two. Now, the company will likely encourage Skype users to migrate to Teams, even though the old platform is now used primarily by individuals.
Image source: xda-developers.com
In its current form, Skype is a far cry from its competitors. It’s a slow web app for Windows that struggles to sync messages and notifications across devices. It doesn’t even have support for Arm processors, which Microsoft has been pushing hard in recent years. The company has, however, occasionally returned to the moribund project, introducing a short video messaging feature called Skype Clips, access to the Copilot AI, the ability to message yourself, and an updated mobile interface to take on rival platforms.
But apparently, all these measures did not help much. The last major update of Skype was released in May 2024, and in December, the Skype Number service, which allowed you to buy real phone numbers to call other numbers outside of Skype, stopped working. There have been no official comments from Microsoft about the closure of the service yet.