News

Dead and Unsupported Microsoft Product Milestones Coming in 2023

• By Kurt Mackie
• 01/04/2023

Some notable Microsoft products will be "retiring" or falling out of support in 2023.

When support ends for a product, Microsoft will stop issuing security fixes for it. Organizations can continue to use such software, but security risks and compliance issues could be consequences.

Microsoft lists many products that will be losing support this year at this page. Below are highlights for some business products that mostly follow Microsoft's Fixed Lifecycle Policy. Typically, such products are considered unsupported after the so-called "Extended Support" phase ends. Extended Support is often, but not always, a five-year period that follows a five-year "Mainstream Support" phase.

Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 January End Dates
Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 are already out of support, but some organizations may be paying for Microsoft's Extended Security Updates (ESU) program, which provides access to "Critical" (and sometimes "Important") security fixes for three years maximum.

Year 3 of the ESU program will be reached for Windows 7, as well as for Windows Server 2008, on Jan. 10, 2023.

That Jan. 10, 2023 date marks the end for Windows 7. However, Microsoft offers a fourth year of ESU support for Windows Server 2008 (and SQL Server 2008) if it gets hosted in an Azure virtual machine.

Organizations pay annually under the ESU program, with the costs going up each year. They'll need the software licensing plus "Software Assurance under an Enterprise Agreement," to qualify.

Other Windows Client 2023 End Dates
The end of the Windows 8.1 client operating system and Windows Embedded 8.1 Pro OSes will occur on Jan. 10, 2023. The same end date pertains to Microsoft's Windows Defender for Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 antivirus software products.

Also going away on that Jan. 10, 2023 date will be the almost forgotten Windows RT OS.

Windows Embedded 8 Standard and Windows Embedded 8.1 Industry both will fall out of support on July 11, 2023.

Windows Embedded Standard 7 will reach Year 3 of ESU support on Oct. 10, 2023.

Various versions of Windows 10 and Window 11 will reach their end-of-service dates this year. Organizations may need to perform OS upgrades to stay supported.

Here are the Windows 10 and Windows 11 service end dates for 2023:

• Windows 10 version 20H2 Enterprise and Education editions will fall out of service on May 9, 2023.
• Windows 10 version 21H2 Home and Pro editions will reach an end on June 13, 2023.
• Windows 11 version 21H2 Home and Pro editions will be unsupported on Oct. 10, 2023.

2013-Branded Servers Losing Support in April
The year 2023 marks the end of support for various 2013-branded Microsoft server products, including Exchange Server 2013, Lync Server 2013 and SharePoint Server 2013. They all will reach their end-of-support milestones on April 11, 2023.

One oddity in the mix is the Skype for Business 2015 Client, which despite seeming to have a couple of more years of product life is scheduled to fall out of support as well on April 11, 2023. However, Skype for Business Server 2015 will still be supported until Oct. 14, 2025.

Microsoft wants Skype for Business Server users to move to Microsoft Teams, but such migrations can be complex matters.

Office 2013 End of Support in April
The Microsoft Office 2013 productivity suite (Excel, PowerPoint, Word, etc.) will fall out of support on April 11, 2023.

Microsoft has upped the stakes for perpetual-license Office users by suggesting that there may be difficulties connecting with Microsoft 365 services, even before the Office product has reached its end-of-support phase. In the case of Office 2013, it's already lost support for Microsoft 365 services integrations, which happened back on Oct. 2020, according to Microsoft's "Windows and Office Configuration Support Matrix" document.

Office apps need to be at the Mainstream Support phase (the first five years) to be assured of having "a supported connection" to Microsoft 365 services, such as OneDrive, Exchange Online and SharePoint Online services, according to Microsoft's "Matrix" document. For more on what Microsoft possibly means about losing supported Office connections to Microsoft 365 services, see this August Redmond article.

Microsoft Office 2019 will fall out of Mainstream Support on Oct. 10, 2023. It'll still have two more years of Extended Support under Microsoft's truncated support policy (Extended Support usually is five years, but Microsoft clipped it for this product). However, Office 2019's exit from Mainstream Support this year means that Microsoft 365 service connections could be iffy, per Microsoft's descriptions in its past announcements and in its documents. Moreover, Microsoft won't necessarily fix any connection problems that may arise.

Microsoft Office 2016 did not get its Mainstream Support clipped by Microsoft. It will get the usual full 10 years of support and will reach its end of Extended Support phase on Oct. 14, 2025.

SQL Server 2008 and SQL Server 2012 End of Support
SQL Server 2008 and SQL Server 2012 have both already reached their end-of-support milestones, but could be still supported for those organizations paying to use Microsoft's ESU program.

SQL Server 2008 will reach Year 4 of ESU support on July 11, 2023. Year 4 ESU support is just permitted to ESU Program participants that opted to host the server in an Azure virtual machine. The ESU normally is a three-year program.

SQL Server 2012, which fell out of Extended Support on July 12, 2022, can also continue to get security patches if organizations subscribe to the ESU program. Year 1 of ESU support for SQL Server 2012 will end on July 11, 2023.

Under the ESU program, organizations can't just buy into Year 2. They will also have to buy Year 1, even if they didn't benefit from it.

Windows Server 2012 Losing Support in October
Support for Windows Server 2012, including the R2 product, will end on Oct. 10, 2023. That's also the end date for Hyper-V Server 2012 and Windows Storage Server 2012 and their R2 product variants.

Dead Products in 2023
Microsoft uses the word "retirement" when referring to its defunct products under its Modern Lifecycle Policy. Retired products aren't supported or available. Here's Microsoft's list of retiring products for 2023:

• Visio Services in SharePoint (in Microsoft 365) ends on Feb. 10, 2023
• Microsoft Azure Virtual Machine (classic) ends on March 1, 2023
• Kaizala ends on Aug. 31, 2023
• Scheduler for Microsoft 365 ends on Sept. 1, 2023.

The Slow Death of Internet Explorer
The Internet Explorer 7 browser, released with Windows Vista and Window Server 2008, will reach its end-of-support phase on Oct. 10, 2023.

Oddly, IE 11, which is the very last of the IE browser product line, is still hanging on. It was supposed to have been permanently disabled by a Windows update on June 15, 2022, but just for certain Windows 10 operating system versions that follow the semiannual channel release update cycle. However, a Dec. 20, 2022 update to Microsoft's FAQ on the topic stated that IE 11 "is scheduled to be permanently disabled through a Microsoft Edge update on certain versions of Windows 10 on February 14, 2023."

Thus, IE 11 will be dying next month, even before IE 7 falls out of support. The odd timing has to do with the browser's association with Windows and the switch to semiannual channel releases with Windows 10.