Jim Rossman: End of the road for some Microsoft Office versions? Yes and no

By clicking submit, I authorize Arcamax and its affiliates to: (1) use, sell, and share my information for marketing purposes, including cross-context behavioral advertising, as described in our Privacy Policy , (2) add to information that I provide with other information like interests inferred from web page views, or data lawfully obtained from data brokers, such as past purchase or location data, or publicly available data, (3) contact me or enable others to contact me by email or other means with offers for different types of goods and services, and (4) retain my information while I am engaging with marketing messages that I receive and for a reasonable amount of time thereafter. I understand I can opt out at any time through an email that I receive, or by clicking here

This week a reader writes, “I recently found the attached article online (the article referenced is about Microsoft ending support for Office 2016 and 2019) and was rather alarmed as I use Outlook 2019 to download and manage email. Can you explain what is happening? My email address is an old Verizon.net address. Will my email and Outlook continue to work indefinitely? Will I be able to get a new version of Office with Outlook with a new computer? I would hate to lose it.”

Coincidentally, this issue hits close to home for me as well.

Microsoft announced the end of support for Office 2019, which includes Outlook 2019. This simply means they will no longer be issuing any software updates or security fixes for this version, and will not guarantee it will continue to work properly with Microsoft’s mail server software.

In case you’re wondering, here’s what Microsoft says about this, “Using versions of Office that are no longer supported, or using Office on unsupported operating systems, might cause performance and reliability issues over time. Also, Office or the operating system might be vulnerable to security threats if security updates are no longer available.”

The main question the reader has is, “Will my email and Outlook continue to work indefinitely?”

The answer to that one is no. Nothing in the computer world will work indefinitely.

For example, you might have loved Windows 95, but eventually you need to move on.

You might find an old Windows 95 computer in your attic, and it may still boot up, but I’m not sure how much of the software on it would still work.

Outlook 2019 will not work indefinitely. You might keep your current computer running it, but eventually it will not be compatible with the mail servers.

Your mail provider may require your version of Outlook to have a certain level of security certificate, and out of date products don’t get those updates from Microsoft.

You can continue to use Outlook 2019 past the end of support date, which is currently set for Oct. 14, 2025.

After that day you won’t notice much difference -- maybe for a long time. There may be popups that will nag you to update.

As long as your computer’s operating system is compatible, the software will launch. If your computer ever dies, and you replace it with whatever the current operating system is at the time, don’t count on being able to obtain or use older versions of your apps.

We all need to plan for what’s next – even if we like what we have now.