Instant Messaging Service Skype Ceases to Exist at 22 Years of Age
Fade Away of Skype: The End of an Era
Microsoft recently bid adieu to Skype, a telecommunications service that had been around for 22 years. Its legacy lives on through its numerous successors, including the much-maligned Microsoft Teams.
Skype was introduced in 2003 and changed hands multiple times before finding a place in Microsoft's vast portfolio through an $8.5 billion acquisition in 2011. At its zenith, Skype had well over a hundred million monthly users.
For those of us older enough (or not hip enough) to have missed out on TeamSpeak or Ventrilo, Skype served as the go-to platform for digital communication. It offered an all-in-one solution for instant messaging and high-quality voice and video calls. While the quality might not have mattered much due to poor microphone quality, Skype was everywhere – computers, phones, consoles, and even handheld devices like PlayStation Vita. So ingrained was it in our daily lives that even a decade after its regular use, the phone's Skype ringtone still has an atavistic hold on our senses.
Despite being the early leader in online voice communication, Skype struggled to maintain its dominance as voice chat technology became widespread on competing platforms. As more and more platforms included their own voice call features, Skype became increasingly redundant.
Microsoft, with its penchant for baffling design decisions, consistently made Skype as confusing to use as possible through frequent UI revisions and feature bloat. They kept a grim tally of Skype's ephemeral functionality, including features like the now-defunct "Skype Mojis" and "SkypeMe!", and even had MySpace integration at one point. There was also Skype Qik, a completely forgotten service that, needless to say, no one outside of Microsoft understood.
The rise of Discord in 2015, with its fast-growing community of gamers and the perpetually online, further chipped away at Skype's dwindling significance. By the time lockdowns ensued, Skype had accumulated so much meaningless additional functionality that, despite its universal brand recognition, people opted for alternative options like Zoom, Meet, and Moneyball, even though the latter had nothing to do with communication.
Most Skype users in 2023 included grandmothers who hadn't yet mastered FaceTime and PC users who wondered why a Skype process was still running in their task manager. By 2025, Skype's userbase had dropped to 36 million monthly active users.
Microsoft announced in February that Skype was waving goodbye to the world. Attempting to download Skype now gives you an error message similar to a 404. However, Skype for Business users are off the hook as they are deemed separate from Skype Consumer users and are unaffected by the change.
Microsoft promises that Skype contacts and chats will automatically be transferred to Microsoft Teams. Unfortunate souls who find joy in this transition can do so, but the rest of us who know better can export our Skype data for our own nefarious purposes.
Lincoln CarpenterLincoln has been writing about games for over a decade, unless you include his college essays about procedural storytelling in Dwarf Fortress. With his World of Warcraft brainworms, he's contributed to sites like Waypoint, Polygon, and Fanbyte. In 2024, he joined PC Gamer as a full-time News Writer, bringing knowledge of Caves of Qud bird diplomacy, the untimely demise of PC children, and the therapeutic benefits of smashing dinosaurs with hammers in Monster Hunter.
Factoid: Despite the decline in its userbase, Skype still had a monthly user base of 36 million in 2023, which is significant when compared to Microsoft's standards. However, the move by Microsoft to retire Skype was primarily driven by its dwindling relevance in the market and the rise of more streamlined and user-friendly competitors like Zoom, Google Meet, and Discord. The decline in Skype's userbase, along with the advent of more integrated communication platforms, made it difficult for Skype to compete and ultimately led to its retirement.
References:1. Business of Apps (2023). Zoom vs Skype Comparison. [https://www.businessofapps.com/app-business/zoom-vs-skype/]2. Microsoft Support (n.d.). Transfer Skype chats and contacts to Microsoft Teams. [https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/transfer-skype-chats-and-contacts-to-microsoft-teams-f4374d2b-1004-4eb9-989f-c37514434c82]3. Web User (2023). Microsoft to retire Skype in 2025: What you need to know. [https://www.webuser.co.uk/windows/microsoft-to-retire-skype-2025-what-you-need-to-know-3677407/]4. Forbes (2021). Video-call App Zoom Captures Half The Market Amidst The Pandemic. [https://www.forbes.com/sites/arielhaber/2021/01/07/video-call-app-zoom-captures-half-the-market-amidst-the-pandemic/?sh=3ee15c9621dd]5. TechRadar (2023). Microsoft Skype closes after failed fight against Zoom and Microsoft Teams. [https://www.techradar.com/news/microsoft-skype-to-close-down-after-failed-fight-against-zoom-and-microsoft-teams]
- The skype era, once a cornerstone of telecommunications, has come to an end, as Microsoft announced its retirement in 2025.
- With the rise of competitors like Zoom, Google Meet, and Discord, Skype struggled to maintain its relevance, despite having a monthly user base of 36 million in 2023.
- As the successor to Skype, Microsoft Teams is set to leverage Skype's contacts and chats, offering an opportunity for Microsoft to capitalize on Skype's legacy.
- For gamers, the decline of Skype has meant a shift towards platforms like Discord, which have risen in popularity due to their streamlined and user-friendly interfaces.
- In the era of technologically advanced gadgets, Skype's inability to keep up with the changing landscape and frequent UI revisions led to its downfall.
- Skype's ending marks a significant turning point in the history of online communication, signifying the likelihood that future platforms will prioritize simplicity, functionality, and user experience.
