End of an Era: Microsoft Shuts Down Skype

Skype quickly become a globally renowned platform for communications in 2003 when it was founded, disrupting the landline industry. For many families, it became a means of calling with audio and video, connecting people across the world with ease. At its peak, Skype boasted millions of users worldwide, with households and businesses adopting the platform on a daily basis.

But what happened and why have Microsoft decided to close down this platform after over two decades?

The Early Days of Skype

The origins of Skype lie in Sweden in 2003, with a team of entrepreneurs looking to develop a means of peer-to-peer communication that worked wirelessly. It was only in 2005 that they developed video calling within the platform, which rapidly became one of its best and most used features.

Over the years, Skype went from strength to strength, building a solid user base in a range of capacities. People would often talk about ‘Skyping’ someone as easily as they would think about ‘Googling’ something, highlighting the impact that this platform had on daily aspects of life for many people. Its popularity drew the attention of global tech giants, including Microsoft, Google and Facebook.

With the popularity of online calling, many other tech giants have started to incorporate these into their own software; Apple developed Facetime for their users, Google developed options such as Google Hangouts, and Zoom became a big player too.

In 2011, Microsoft won the bid for the purchase of Skype, making it the biggest deal they had made at the time. They spent $8.5 billion to purchase the platform, complete with its 160+ million active users (news.microsoft.com/announcement/microsoft-acquires-skype/). Quickly, Microsoft began to integrate the software into its technologies, such as Xbox and Windows devices, giving users more opportunities to connect with each other across platforms and devices. However, this sadly did not give them the desired impact, as they struggled to keep up with the likes of Facetime and Google’s multiple app options.

The Peak of Skype

At its peak, Skype had a phenomenal amount of globally active users, rising in popularity easily.

Some of the stats over the years emphasise how quickly this has become a vital part of daily life:

• Initial users reached roughly 1 million in 2004
• At its peak, Skype saw 300 million active users in 2015
• In 2017, the daily active users had reached 40 million
• By 2014, 50% of all Skype calls were video calls

(Stats from: inetventures.com/blog/skype-shutdown/)

Skype is a platform that supports over 108 languages across 180+ countries worldwide, making it one of the most adaptable and user-friendly video and audio communication tools. It provided users with a simple means of messaging and video calling on all devices.

The Downfall of Skype

Skype continued to enjoy huge success for almost two decades, having millions of active users daily across the world; however, in March 2020, the world was locked down due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Sadly, this saw the rise of other video calling platforms that rapidly became more popular for communications.

When COVID-19 hit the world, many workplaces started to work from home overnight, quickly needing to find a means of easy communication for their teams. It was during this time that platforms such as Zoom and Microsoft Teams became giants in the workplace industries, replacing Skype.

Microsoft began to prioritise its own development platform, Teams, above that of Skype in 2017, creating a drop in active users and popularity. Teams quickly became integrated into Microsoft’s software, with emphasis on this being the easy-to-use workplace system for many. They increasingly focused on this and stopped pushing users towards Skype.

Microsoft have stated that they have seen the power of Skype first hand and have understood it to be an integral part of shaping modern methods of communication. They will now be looking to integrate users’ Skype logins, chats and communications with their own Teams platform, offering users this free platform for communications moving forward.

Outside of the workplace, Skype struggled to stay at the forefront of video calling apps due to the rise of WhatsApp, Facetime and other mobile-friendly communication tools. This created a downturn in their number of daily active users, seeing its popularity decrease rapidly.

What’s Next for Skype

Sadly, the lack of prioritisation and drive for this platform since 2020 has led to its demise, giving Microsoft an opportunity to push even further with their own platform, Microsoft Team,s in both workplaces and individual settings.

For current users of Skype, integration into the Microsoft Teams family will be done, creating a seamless user transfer without losing data or contacts. Teams offers a range of services for users, including individual and group communications, the creation of Teams within the platform for wider communications, and audio and video calling with ease. Microsoft will also be pushing its calendar management features that effortlessly integrate with Outlook, Microsoft’s emailing platform.

On the 5^th May 2025, Skype will be shut down, making way for other tech giants to continue driving their own video communications platforms in the ever-evolving technological era.