Microsoft will soon discontinue support for Google, Facebook chat in Outlook.com

Microsoft will soon discontinue support for Google, Facebook chat in Outlook.com

Microsoft will soon discontinue support for Google, Facebook chat in Outlook.com

Under Satya Nadella’s reign, Microsoft has been undergoing many structural changes. The latest move comes in the form of the company’s decision to pull support for Facebook and Google chat.

Outlook has sent an email to its customers informing them about its decision to discontinue support for Facbeook and Google chat in Outlook.com. It further said that Outlook will not come integrated with Google Chat either as Google has discontinued the chat protocol used by Google Talk platform.

“Microsoft’s Google Talk support in Outlook.com was a highly requested feature shortly before the software maker introduced it in May 2013. Microsoft is now pushing customers to use Skype in Outlook.com, in a move that feels similar to the retirement of the Windows Live Messenger service back in late 2012,” points out a piece in TheVerge.

The company hasn’t disclosed why it plans to pull support from Facebook chat. However, Microsoft reportedly believes that most of its users chat via Skype. Lately, the company has been focusing on Skype and have added several improvements.

Recently, Microsoft announced real-time translation by launching a Spanish-English test program using its Skype messaging service. The program had its first trial with school children in Mexico City and their counterparts at a school in Tacoma, Washington. Late last year, the company also added Skype group chats to Office Online in their latest update.