Microsoft shuts down Office program after 35 years

Microsoft has announced that the classic layout program Publisher will soon be a thing of the past.

After 35 years on the market, the company is discontinuing development and support of the program that was once meant to compete with professional tools like QuarkXPress and Adobe’s Pagemaker, the predecessor to InDesign.

A program that never found its place

Publisher was launched in 1991 as a more user-friendly alternative to the professional design programs that dominated the market at the time.

The idea was to allow ordinary users to create brochures, flyers and newsletters without having to learn complicated tools.

But the program never really caught on with designers and businesses.

For professionals, the features were too limited, and for many regular users, Word and PowerPoint already covered their needs.

Microsoft released the last version of Publisher in 2021, and by Office 2024, it was no longer part of the package. Therefore, the decision to stop completely comes as no big surprise.

The end of an era

According to Microsoft’s official announcement, all support for Publisher will end in October 2026. After that, the program will no longer be available to Microsoft 365 subscribers.

Users who still have Publisher installed from Office 2021 can continue to use the program, but updates and bug fixes will no longer be issued.

This marks the end of Microsoft’s 35-year commitment to desktop publishing, an area that the company has gradually withdrawn from in recent years.

Possible alternatives to Publisher

Microsoft recommends that users create flyers and brochures in Word, PowerPoint or the newer design tool Microsoft Designer.

However, none of these programs are true replacements for Publisher.

For those who need more advanced features, many experts point to Adobe InDesign, which is now the industry standard for professional layout work.

A newer and free alternative is Affinity by Canva, which combines text layout, image editing and vector graphics in one program.

With Publisher on its way out, Microsoft marks the end of a piece of Office history.