After 20 years of existence, Yahoo Messenger would cease to exist come July 17!
This stoppage of service was made known by Oath – the Verizon subsidiary which owns Yahoo and AOL. Yahoo would be putting to rest its instant messaging platform Yahoo Messenger (which originally debuted in 1998 as Yahoo Pager) in July, which is indeed the end of an era for the iconic messaging platform.
The platform is one of the very first instant messaging apps on the market that was very popular among Internet users back then.
It’s been a fun ride, but Yahoo Messenger is logging off for the last time.
Peace out. ✌️ https://t.co/UFMi0efhMl pic.twitter.com/4aMXppb9cZ
— Yahoo Mail – Bring joy to your inbox (@yahoomail) June 7, 2018
There currently isn’t a replacement product available for Yahoo Messenger. We’re constantly experimenting with new services and apps, one of which is an invite-only group messaging app called Yahoo Squirrel (currently in beta) –Oath.
As a peace offering, although not a direct replacement for Yahoo Messenger, users are being advised to try out its new group messaging app, Squirrel, which is still an invite-only group messaging app which will be rolled out to the public when Yahoo Messenger shuts down. Interested members can request for an invite here.
After 20 years, Yahoo messenger is shutting down, so many love stories began here 😊
There was this feature called 'Offline messages' on Yahoo messenger. Coz, there was a concept of people being offline as well. Farewell pic.twitter.com/eKCs0SGXPV
— Gabbbar (@GabbbarSingh) June 10, 2018
The company gave no specific reason for the demise of Yahoo Messenger but saying it would be “focusing on building and introducing new, exciting communications tools that better fit consumer needs.” However, the reason may not be far-fetched, given the huge dominance of the messaging landscape by platforms such as WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Snapchat, Wechat amongst others which has left the platform with little or no impact (even with its recent update).
After 20 Years, #YahooMessenger is shutting down on July 17! RIP to our #ChildhoodMemories! pic.twitter.com/OFWHdsMPSO
— Amit Panchal (@AmitHPanchal) June 9, 2018
And as a last Hooray, Yahoo makes a provision for users to download their entire chat history on Messenger for the next six months by going here. Note that the downloaded files would go straight to your computer or device, and not to any other messaging app.