Windows Phone to Rest in Peace (finally)

Microsoft has decided to stop the further manufacturing of Windows Phones. There will be no further development in hardware or features for it. The platform was introduced to the market as a refreshing alternative to IOS and Android phones. And that was also one of the reasons for the low popularity of Windows phones.

This platform still had some potential to build excellent smartphones, but there was a lot of complication involved in porting the apps that are already made for IOS and Android. Besides, it was relatively easy to port between IOS and Android.

Microsoft had recognized this problem over the years and they launched many tools to advance the porting process. They launched project Astoria to smooth the port of Android apps to Windows but due to lack of positive feedback from developers they killed the project. Project Islandwood, the IOS tool to bridge IOS and Windows apps was getting some success, but still, it wasn’t enough to make Windows compete with Android and IOS.

In the beginning, Windows Phones managed to get themselves small but dedicated fans, but they also abandoned this platform because of less number of apps which in turn affected the Windows apps developer as they were getting a little incentive on their apps. The software giant persisted in developing further porting tools. It also launched Project Centennial to port the vast libraries of Win32 apps to UWP. The success rate was again not up to the expected mark.

In Frustration, Microsoft even started developing apps on behalf of other companies such as Facebook. Also, Google deleted the Youtube app that was developed by Microsoft for Windows phone. It became evident to Microsoft that it couldn’t compete with IOS and Android.

After yielding of Microsoft, only two platforms are going to win the war viz. Android and IOS. Both are achieving great success, and their hardware and software updates are getting smaller by the year. In the meantime, new areas are launching such as mixed reality and AI. After analysing these new areas, the decision of Microsoft to abandon Windows phone make sense as it must utilise its resources in these fields so that it won’t get left behind yet again.

As for now, Microsoft will continue to provide security and stability updates to the limited users who are using Windows phone and nothing else. Some Windows Lovers will surely miss them.