Skype for Business Online to be replaced by Microsoft Teams in 2021

Microsoft announced that Skype for Business Online will be retired on July 31, 2021.

Microsoft retires Skype for Business Online in two years

This comes as a natural continuation to a process that was started in 2017, namely Microsoft calls it, combines chat, calling, video, and document collaboration.

The idea is that Teams combines all these features and more in a single, integrated app, the workflow and the experience being much more intuitive and complex in Teams.

If you’re a current Skype for Business Online customer, you’ll be happy to know that for now, things will remain the same and you’ll be able to add new users and continue your work without any changes.

However, from September 1, 2019, all new Office 365 customers will be onboarded to Teams for chat, meetings, and calling. Also, Skype Consumer service and Skype for Business Server will remain the same.

Teams will include many Skype for Business Online features

To help customers migrate easily to Teams, Microsoft is working on adding missing features from Skype for Business Online as follows:

• Dynamic 911. A feature of Microsoft Teams Phone System, Dynamic E911 automatically uses the caller’s current location to route to a Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP) call center operated by the local government.  Dynamic E911 will be delivered in Teams for the United States by the end of this calendar year.
• Shorter Retention Periods. New retention period options will allow customers to limit channel and chat retention periods to as short as 1 day and ensure that when data is deleted it is removed from all permanent storage locations in the Teams service.  Shorter Retention Periods will be available in Teams by the end of this calendar year.
• Teams and Skype Consumer Interop. Interop between Teams and Skype Consumer will allow users on the two services to communicate using both chat and calling.  Teams and Skype Consumer Interop will be available in Teams in the first quarter of calendar year 2020.
• Contact Center Integration and Compliance Recording. At Inspire earlier this month we announced Teams partnerships with Five9, Genesys, and NICE to enable Contact Center solutions – and with ASC, NICE, and Verint to provide Compliance Recording.   We’re also working with other Skype for Business Online certified partners to bring other Contact Center and Compliance Recording solutions to market for Teams.

With these changes, Microsoft aims to make the transition smoother and to help customers every step of the way.