Microsoft Advertising retires mobile app in January 2026

Microsoft introduced the retirement of its cellular promoting utility on November 24, 2025, based on e-mail notifications despatched to advertisers. The app will cease functioning in January 2026 and shall be faraway from the Apple App Retailer and Google Play in November 2025.

“As of January 2026, you may not be capable of use the Microsoft Promoting cellular app,” based on the notification from the Microsoft Promoting Group. “Whereas your whole present campaigns will stay accessible in Microsoft Promoting, you may not be capable of create or handle campaigns within the app.”

The e-mail specified that the app removing from each main app shops will happen in November 2025. Customers who’ve already put in the applying might proceed utilizing it and obtain safety updates till the January 2026 retirement date.

The retirement eliminates mobile-specific performance that advertisers have used because the app’s preliminary launch. The applying offered efficiency monitoring for favourite campaigns, standing and funds updates, notification administration for automated guidelines and bank card expirations, side-by-side metric comparisons, and direct entry to Microsoft Promoting assist. These capabilities allowed advertisers to handle accounts from smartphones and tablets with out accessing the complete desktop interface.

Microsoft directs customers to the web-based Microsoft Promoting interface for continued marketing campaign administration. The corporate has not introduced a alternative cellular utility or mobile-optimized internet interface to deal with the performance hole created by the retirement.

The applying confronted usability challenges that appeared in person suggestions all through 2025. Google Play critiques from July, October, and November 2025 documented points with cellular interface design, navigation difficulties, and restricted enhancing capabilities. One reviewer characterised the expertise as “not designed for cellular use” with unattainable web page viewing even when aspect scrolling. One other famous the shortcoming to edit campaigns regardless of claims of administration performance.

Microsoft maintained a 4.0 score from 4,830 critiques on Google Play, with the app accumulating over 100,000 downloads. The applying final acquired an replace on July 17, 2025, which added Simplified Chinese language language assist and locale formatting. The corporate acknowledged that some options remained unavailable for Sensible Marketing campaign clients.

The retirement comes as Microsoft consolidates its advertising infrastructure around AI-powered tools and web-based management interfaces. The corporate crossed $20 billion in annual promoting income in April 2025, with CEO Satya Nadella emphasizing transformation of search and looking via Copilot as an AI-powered private assistant.

Microsoft has launched a number of web-based AI instruments all through 2025 to reinforce marketing campaign administration capabilities. The company launched Performance Comparison tools and Image Animation features on November 17, 2025, extending Copilot’s capabilities throughout the Microsoft Promoting Platform. These instruments allow advertisers to research marketing campaign efficiency and create video belongings from static pictures with out requiring separate cellular purposes.

The retirement displays broader shifts in how promoting platforms strategy cellular performance. Campaign automation tools from third-party verification providers have more and more dealt with duties beforehand requiring devoted cellular apps. DoubleVerify expanded its Microsoft Promoting integration in October 2025 to incorporate DV Marketing campaign Automator, which manages marketing campaign creation, tag implementation, and efficiency reporting via programmatic connections fairly than cellular interfaces.

Microsoft’s promoting platform developments in 2025 centered on consolidating administration instruments throughout the internet interface. The company introduced enhanced website exclusion capabilities in August 2025, enabling advertisers to centrally handle exclusions throughout accounts and campaigns with bulk utility to a number of campaigns concurrently. The system permits as much as 10,000 web sites per exclusion record and as much as 100 lists per account via the online platform.

Platform updates additionally addressed writer necessities and measurement requirements. Microsoft mandated Clarity installation for all third-party publishers in November 2025, filtering non-compliant visitors as nonbillable. This requirement emphasizes behavioral analytics integration via web-based instruments fairly than cellular app performance.

The cellular app retirement aligns with Microsoft’s technique of constructing conversational, AI-powered promoting experiences accessible via browsers fairly than platform-specific purposes. Analysis from August 2025 demonstrated that Microsoft Copilot achieved 73% higher click-through rates in comparison with conventional search promoting, with buyer journeys via Copilot 33% shorter than standard search paths.

Advertisers managing campaigns throughout a number of platforms might face operational changes following the cellular app retirement. The online interface gives full marketing campaign administration capabilities however requires browser entry fairly than native cellular performance. Microsoft has not disclosed whether or not mobile-optimized internet options will compensate for the misplaced native app expertise.

The notification really helpful that advertisers go to the Microsoft Promoting internet platform to create and handle campaigns, view marketing campaign efficiency, and entry extra instruments. The corporate specified that present campaigns would stay unaffected by the retirement, with all marketing campaign knowledge accessible via the online interface.

Business observers famous that the retirement follows Microsoft’s discontinuation of Microsoft Invest (formerly Xandr), introduced in Could 2025 with an efficient date of February 28, 2026. Company Vice President Kya Sainsbury-Carter cited incompatibility between conventional demand-side platform fashions and Microsoft’s imaginative and prescient for conversational, customized, and agentic promoting futures.

The cellular app supported a number of options designed for on-the-go marketing campaign administration. Advertisers might monitor favourite campaigns and retrieve efficiency knowledge, shortly replace marketing campaign standing, budgets, and bids, obtain notifications about automated rule execution and bank card expiration, visualize account and advert efficiency with side-by-side metric comparisons, and get in touch with Microsoft Promoting assist immediately via the app.

For the advertising and marketing neighborhood, the retirement alerts continued business motion towards unified web-based platforms fairly than fragmented cellular purposes. Advertisers who relied on cellular performance for fast marketing campaign changes or efficiency monitoring might want to adapt workflows to browser-based entry or implement third-party marketing campaign administration instruments that combine with Microsoft Promoting’s API.

The app’s removing from shops in November 2025 gives a one-month window earlier than the January 2026 full shutdown. Microsoft specified that customers with present installations might proceed receiving safety updates till the ultimate retirement date, although no new characteristic growth would happen throughout this transition interval.

Timeline

Abstract

Who: Microsoft Promoting introduced the retirement affecting all customers of its cellular utility throughout iOS and Android platforms.

What: The Microsoft Promoting cellular app shall be faraway from the Apple App Retailer and Google Play in November 2025, with full performance termination in January 2026. Customers who have already got the app put in might proceed utilizing it and obtain safety updates till the January retirement date. All marketing campaign knowledge stays accessible via the web-based Microsoft Promoting interface.

When: Microsoft despatched e-mail notifications on November 24, 2025. The app removing from shops happens in November 2025, with remaining retirement in January 2026.

The place: The retirement impacts the cellular utility accessible on each Apple App Retailer and Google Play globally. Customers ought to entry Microsoft Promoting via the online interface at microsoft.com/promoting.

Why: Microsoft is consolidating marketing campaign administration capabilities inside its web-based platform as a part of its broader technique to construct AI-powered, conversational promoting experiences via Copilot and different web-based instruments. The corporate has invested closely in internet interface enhancements all through 2025 whereas the cellular app confronted usability challenges documented in person critiques.