Microsoft is shutting down its Outlook Lite app for Android

Microsoft is retiring its compact Outlook Lite app for Android – It will soon stop working

Outlook Lite now had a death date. According to Neowin, Microsoft has confirmed that its Outlook Lite app for Android will stop working on May 25th. This will force users to move onto its larger Outlook app, which will remain available. Outlook Lite was never released for iOS.

Outlook Lite is a small 17MB version of Outlook that focuses on delivering faster performance, lower storage use, and lower battery drain. Compared to the over 100MB Outlook app, Outlook Lite is tiny. That said, Microsoft now sees no need to maintain two separate Outlook apps for Android.

Microsoft has already blocked new downloads of Outlook Lite. On May 25th, the app will stop functioning. The app will open, but the mailbox is disabled, and the app will become effectively useless.

The good news is that Android users can still use the standard Outlook app. That said, it is a shame that Microsoft’s lightweight app ambitions have ended. While it makes sense for Microsoft to focus its resources on a single app, it is a shame that Microsoft’s Outlook Lite efforts couldn’t be leveraged to make the standard Outlook app faster and less storage-intensive.

Microsoft claims that focusing on its Outlook mobile app for Android will improve security. After all, maintaining and testing a single app is much easier than maintaining/testing two.

You can join the discussion on Outlook Lite’s retirement on the OC3D Forums.