As you probably already know, Microsoft is ending support for Windows 10 very soon, this October. The OS turned 10 last month, but it is not the only decade-old Microsoft feature that is going out of support soon.
The company has announced that it is also retiring the Microsoft Lens , which is in fact, a year older than Windows 10 as this scanner app (for documents and more) debuted back in March 2014 on the Windows Phone. At the time, it was known as the "Office Lens" app, and Microsoft released it for Android and iOS too, about a year later.
Later in 2021, the app was renamed to Microsoft Lens, and over on both the Google Play Store and Apple App Store, the software is very highly rated with it being one of the best-rated free Microsoft apps on both fronts.
Unfortunately, for those that use it, the tech giant notes that it will retire the Microsoft Lens mobile app for iOS and Android in phases beginning September 15 2025, and this will carry on till the end of the year.
After December 15, 2025, Microsoft says that users will not be able to create new scans, though their existing files will stay available in the MyScans folder without further support.
The full phase-out timeline is given below:
-
Mid-September 2025: Retirement process begins.
-
Mid-October 2025: New installs of Microsoft Lens will be disabled in the Apple App Store and Google Play Store.
-
Mid-November 2025: Microsoft Lens will be removed from app stores.
-
Mid-December 2025: Users will no longer be able to create new scans in the Microsoft Lens app.
If you are wondering about a replacement, you would be absolutely correct if you had guessed it would be some Copilot app, as after all, that is what seems to take the front seat these days.
As such, for document scanning going forward, Microsoft recommends the Scan feature in the Microsoft 365 Copilot app as it "will continue to invest in new features and improvements" there. The Scan feature on the Microsoft 365 Copilot app on Android now supports scanning text in Word, tables in Excel, and more. The company notes that new scans saved to OneDrive can be accessed under MyCreations in the Copilot app.
For those who have access to the Microsoft 365 Admin Center portal, they can find the message under ID MC1131064.