Skype for Windows Phone will stop working in 2017

With the release of Windows 10 Mobile, Microsoft's support for Windows Phone is gradually starting to die off. We already knew that Windows Phone support for Skype was coming to an end, but now we know more.

Microsoft has now announced that as well as ending support for Skype on Windows Phone in October, come 'early 2017' the apps will simply stop working. And it's all thanks to a move to the cloud.

The company has already said that the future of Skype is cloud-based rather than peer-to-peer, and this is the reason Windows Phone support is coming to a complete stop. Considering the amount of investment Microsoft has put into Skype, the decision to kill the app entirely is perhaps a little strange, but legacy support -- particularly for such a niche handset -- does not come cheap.

In an update to the Skype support pages, Microsoft says:

While support will no longer be available from October 2016, the Skype app on Windows Phone 8 and Windows Phone 8.1 will continue to work (possibly with some limitations) until early 2017, when we finish moving Skype calling to the cloud (see Skype blog).

While it's true that there are not many people who will mourn the loss of Skype for Windows Phone, there are still some who rely on the tool and will be forced to either seek out an alternative, or invest in a new phone in just a few months.