Microsoft Cortana, mobile app will get discontinued for android as well as iOS from January 31, 2020. As Microsoft will include personal digital assistant to its Microsoft 365 productivity apps.
Cortana was introduced in the year 2015 as a standalone application. Microsoft was frequently integrating the app with its application and services like outlook and skype. But it was not able to compete with Amazon’s Alexa and Google Assitant. Satya Nadella, Microsoft CEO also accept this fact and says
You should be able to use it on Google Assistant, you should be able to use it on Alexa, just like how you use our apps on Android and iOS so that’s at least how we want to think about where it’ll go
Microsoft will be discontinuing its Cortana mobile app in some selected countries like India, Australia, the UK, China, Spain, Mexic, Germany, Canada and more. the users of these countries can access their lists and reminders through Cortana on Windows.
Mircosoft has written a supporting article in a blog post ‘Changes to Cortana services‘
the Cortana content you created–such as reminders and lists–will no longer function in the Cortana mobile app or Microsoft Launcher, but can still be accessed through Cortana on Windows. Also, Cortana reminders, lists, and tasks are automatically synced to the Microsoft ‘To-Do’ app, which you can download to your phone for free
Microsoft considers Cortana as a specific virtual assistant app for Office 365. It is a Microsoft’s productivity suite version which requires subscriptions. Cortana Android app and Cortana iOS app, both will support the download of ‘To Do’ app for free.
The company will launch an updated version of Microsoft Launcher after removing the Cortana app. Microsoft did not clarify its plan of Cortana for remaining country’s users of iOS and Android.