• Diyan
• On July 21, 2016

Skype drops support for older operating systems

Microsoft announced that users with Windows Phone 8 & 8.1 will no longer receive updates as Skype becomes a cloud service and the company is focusing on improving the experience where the majority of the end users are. Along with dropping support for Windows Phone, Microsoft cuts Skype updates for iOS and Android below versions 8.0 and 4.03.

Microsoft adds:

Our focus will be on the newly released lighter, faster and more responsive UWP app for Windows 10, Skype for iPhone, iPad and Android as well as a web-based native version of Skype for other supported platforms like previous Windows operating Systems, Mac and Linux, which will benefit from the latest ORTC or WebRTC technology that we’ve been working on for the last year.

While dropping support for older Windows Phones which are still used by more than 80% of the phone users, the company reasonably focuses entirely on Windows 10 which already has more than 300 million active devices and the development of the UWP Skype app is the same for PCs, Phones, Xbox, HoloLens and SurfaceHub.

Users with phones like the Lumia 920 or 1020 can still access Skype and send messages in the future, but their experience won’t be as good as those with the new app for Windows 10.

Source: Skype