Microsoft hangs up on Skype: service to shut down May 5, 2025

Skype is closing after the market for calling the Internet 23 years ago. Microsoft, which acquired the messaging and calling app 14 years ago, says it will double the team from active duty on May 5th. Skype users have 10 weeks to decide what to do with their account.

It is not clear how many people are affected. The most recent numbers that Microsoft divided in 2021 was when it said it had more than 36 million users – Skype’s 300 million users long from top.

“We know this is a big deal for our Skype users, and we are highly grateful for their Skype support and all the teaching work on the team in the last seven years,” Jeff TapperThe president of Microsoft 365 and the president of the platform told TechCrunch in an interview this week. “At the moment, keeping all our focus on the back of the parties allows us to give us a simple message and to carry out quick innovation.”

From now on May 5, users will have the option to transfer all their contacts and chat data to Microsoft Team platformThe Alternatively, users can download their Skype data using the app -built export tool.

Business case

For those who have followed Skype in recent years, this news will be a little surprised; And in different ways, the writing has been on the wall since the 2016 2016, when Microsoft team debutedThe

Was Microsoft Has launched a specific skype for business products In 2015, the arrival of the teams has indicated a new aspect for Microsoft at the cloud communication. Many teams have been compared to a slack clone, but the big ambition was to create a platform that gives space and text chatting in a wide range of Microsoft and other applications, and it includes video and text chatting – direct overlap with Skype.

Microsoft then Publishing plan Skype for business in 2017, Four years later this attempt was finishedIn 2021. In the same year, parties selected as Microsoft team In Windows 11 preferred integrated contact appTo send Skype to the sideline.

Fast forward until December 2024, TechCrunch reports Microsoft stopped Let Skype users add Credit In their account, or buy Skype phone numberInstead of pressing users monthly subscriptions and Skype-to-phone plans.

And so it takes us to the news today, a brand and organization end Dial-up daysThe

Skype’s Death Nell comes after two years Microsoft started roll out A complete rebuild, rebuilding team desktop and web applications. During these two years, Tapper says that the customer calling in the parties has increased fourfold, though he refuses to say how many consumers make 320 million users-base.

“It’s on a high-laid scale that we feel great about the app [Teams] For personal use, “said Tapper. “We feel that customers have mileage under our belt about receiving, [who are] The parties use in their personal life. We thought [shutting down Skype] For a while, however, we really felt that customers need to show us the last user, saying that customers are ready for us. “

And Microsoft believes that customers are ready now.

The number of user

Skype begins with a new age of internet-based communication, starting with voice, Being expanding in the video And file-sharing, the arrival of smartphones and a swath of new messaging applications have done a damage to the use of Skype for years. For context, WhatsApp Has traveled to 2 billion users in the past At 2020.

Skype when Filed for an IPO in the 21stIt has revealed 560 million registered user and 124 million monthly active user. However, in terms of this, rather than approaching the public Spin off to eBay (Which was aCkquired it in 2005), Microsoft $ 8.5 billion bids for Skype in 20And the platform has grown to a top 300 million users in 2013The

Microsoft did not practice breaking the number of Skype users in later years, though it occasionally teased the data point. The company is the beginning of the epidemic in March 2021 Published This Skype increased 70% of the month-monthly 40 million users per day, because people wanted a way to contact loved ones during lockdown — it was a tendency that was generated Sarkar Surge on rival platforms Such zoom.

The most recent update provided by Microsoft was through a Blog post published in early 2023 With the announcement of integration between Skype and its bing search engines, it revealed that “more than 36 million people use Skype daily to connect through phone calls and chats worldwide”.

Although it is long and short, though, the growth of the Tims and the flatlining of Skype is one of the reasons for Microsoft count now is a good time to go to the teams.

“Skype took a push like parties during the epidemic – and Skype was quite stable in most cases in the last few years,” said Tapper. “And we felt the time and the response was that we could take this step.”

Phone home

Microsoft is encouraging users to go on top The team is freeThe It provides some additional features available in Skype, such as calendar integrations, but the team lacks free other main features that were featured in Skype-especially, phone-coling effectiveness that allows users to call mobile and landline numbers, as well as taking phone calls with Skype phone numbers.

Microsoft started To re -evaluate these services in DecemberSkype number prevents users from adding any more credit to their accounts when stopping buying. Users were still able to call on phone numbers with a valid monthly subscription or any remaining credit of them, but subscription renewal will end on April 3.

For Legacy users who still have credit in the account, Microsoft Skype will be available in the web portal and both in teams indefinitely Skype dial pad.

“We will support [this] As long as users have credit and they use this effectiveness, “Microsoft VP of the product Amit Tell TechCrunch.

In spite of the enterprise avatar of parties To provide phone-coling effectivenessFlower confirmed that parties would not support free PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network) Services, in most cases because of the transfer of consumer trends.

“We have been monitoring the use of telephony for a while on Skype, and the patterns have changed, the use has changed and it is a step towards him,” he said. “People have mobile data plans, and when it is [telephony] The effectiveness was published many years ago, it was not. “

System migration

During the Transition Period, Skype users will be able to log in and log in with their Skype certificates, transferring all their chats and contacts automatically. The Skype app itself will continue to work in Tendem by May 5, 2025.

Alternatively, users will be able to export their data, though in reality it will probably be able to do so with it in importing elsewhere.

“We wanted to make sure that people were not losing their contacts during this conversion, their memories,” said blossom. “We want to make sure we save the things we have shared. And if they prefer to come to the party we’ll recover all their contacts and data “”

If a user does not take any action by May 5, Skype says it will hold the user’s data until the end of the year, after which it will be removed.

Blinking line

One of the larger acceptances from all this is how the lines have blurred in the business and consumer states, because as part of the social rules around the trend like technology and distant work.

Skype started as a consumer product that spreads in the field of business, when parties started as a business product Divided into consumerThe Parties today, though still Feeling Like a business product, especially because of its names. Family and friends are really looking at yourself as part of a big “team”?

Tapper, for its part, does not see it as a problem, provided that many of its existing products have already crossed the boundary in use.

“I think a lot of people will convert [from Skype to Teams]He said. “If you think about Word, Excel, PowerPoint, they are brands that work for people for business and personal use. Our kids and parents are doing their homework and budgets and their homework, so we have a precedent about using our tools in our personal and work life “”