Microsoft is cleaning house, and this mobile app didn’t make the cut
Lens is being retired on iOS and Android.
Microsoft is preparing to retire one of its long-standing mobile apps. The company will remove Microsoft Lens – also widely known as Office Lens – from iOS and Android in the coming months.
Another app bites the dust as Microsoft shifts its focus toward AI. Microsoft Lens will follow in the footsteps of Windows 10, as the company streamlines its software lineup.
The retirement timeline is clear: support for Microsoft Lens ends on February 9, and the app will stop working entirely after March 9. You won’t be able to create new scans after that date, but if the app is still installed on your device, your existing scans will remain accessible.
Microsoft Lens joins the app retirement list
Another app bites the dust as Microsoft shifts its focus toward AI. Microsoft Lens will follow in the footsteps of Windows 10, as the company streamlines its software lineup.
The app is still listed on Google Play and the App Store, but there’s no point in downloading it anymore. | Image credit – Microsoft
Microsoft is pointing users toward OneDrive as the replacement. The scanning tools from Lens are built right into OneDrive now, making a separate app redundant. You’ll still be able to capture documents, receipts, and whiteboards, edit and crop them digitally, and even convert images into Word or PDF files. The one limitation? OneDrive doesn’t let you store these files locally on your device, which may be inconvenient for some.
Office Lens originally launched in 2015 for iOS and Android after its early debut on Windows Phone. Back then, it stood out for its deep Office integration and was part of Microsoft’s “mobile-first” push on iOS and Android a decade ago.
Honestly, Lens’s retirement isn’t a shock – the company announced its plans as far back as August. This has given users plenty of time to prepare and shift their workflows to OneDrive or other alternatives.
Microsoft Lens is basically getting caught in Microsoft’s push to bundle similar tools into fewer apps, and honestly, that move isn’t that surprising. AI isn’t just about job cuts or needing more powerful chips and memory – it also changes where companies put their money. Instead of keeping a bunch of smaller apps alive, more of that budget is now going straight into AI, which makes it harder to justify maintaining products like Lens.
I guess at this point, it feels like only a matter of time before even more older apps disappear, leaving just a handful – or maybe someday even a single app – handling all the tasks that multiple apps used to do.
In other recent Microsoft news, the company has made offline Windows activation far more difficult. And if you were hoping to switch from Edge to OpenAI’s Atlas browser, it doesn’t look like Microsoft is making that easy either.
Office Lens originally launched in 2015 for iOS and Android after its early debut on Windows Phone. Back then, it stood out for its deep Office integration and was part of Microsoft’s “mobile-first” push on iOS and Android a decade ago.
We’ve had time to see this coming
Honestly, Lens’s retirement isn’t a shock – the company announced its plans as far back as August. This has given users plenty of time to prepare and shift their workflows to OneDrive or other alternatives.
A look at the bigger trend
I guess at this point, it feels like only a matter of time before even more older apps disappear, leaving just a handful – or maybe someday even a single app – handling all the tasks that multiple apps used to do.
In other recent Microsoft news, the company has made offline Windows activation far more difficult. And if you were hoping to switch from Edge to OpenAI’s Atlas browser, it doesn’t look like Microsoft is making that easy either.
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