For the unfamiliar, Outlook.com Premium made its debut just this year, in February. It promised users an ad-free experience, personalized emails, calendar and contact sharing, and more. The launch came with a special price of $19.95 a year, later going up to $49.99. It’s a lot to pay for a few email features and its difficult to tell what Microsoft’s motivations are. It could be that there will simply too few subscribers, or it’s possible Microsoft just wants to focus on its already strong Office 365 instead.
No New Subscriptions
Whatever the case, Outlook.com Premium is no longer accepting new customers. Existing customers will be able to renew current subscriptions, however, and Microsoft has no plans to ax that “at this time”. However, many Outlook.com Premium subscribers will also subscribers of Office 365, making that less useful. Microsoft will not offer refunds for the remaining months of subscriptions despite this. Meanwhile, Office 365 will get ad-free browsing, up to 50GB of storage, and quick technical support, but no custom domain features. It is working on a feature to transfer those domains to other providers, but it’s not clear when that will launch. Still, Office 365 members will be getting features at no extra expense, and Premium members will be getting the same service they always did. There may be some overlap, but those simply looking for an ad-free experience will be much better served.
