In the last few hours, Microsoft has announced that the OneDrive users on Windows 7, 8 or 8.1 they will not be able to synchronize their content with the cloud starting March 1, 2022. Furthermore, the service will no longer receive updates if it is running on a system that does not have Windows 10 or Windows 11 installed. In short, it would seem that the technological giant is doing everything to push the new version of Windows.
OneDrive: goodbye to support on Windows 7 and 8
In an effort to push the use of Windows 11 as much as possible, Microsoft is trying to limit the OneDrive support on Windows 7 and 8. The files will remain accessible from the application, but will no longer be automatically uploaded to the cloud. In any case, to avoid any problems, the technological giant recommends updating to a more recent version of the operating system before March 2022. As for systems that are unable to run Windows 10 or Windows 11, Microsoft states that users can still back up their files by uploading them to the OneDrive web app.
In addition to stopping updates and syncing, OneDrive will lose the support on Windows 7, 8 and 8.1 starting from 1 January 2022. According to Microsoft, the reason for the change is linked to the desire to “focus resources on new technologies and operating systems and provide users with the most updated and secure experience”. On the other hand, a similar situation has already occurred in the past. The Windows 8 lifecycle ended in 2016, with Microsoft discontinuing mainstream support for Windows 8.1 in 2018 and Windows 7 in 2020. And now Microsoft is planning to end support for Windows 10 in 2025. Therefore, this could be the time to start preparing for the Windows 11 update.