Announcement - Microsoft Publisher to be discontinued after October 2026

I only fairly recently bought Publisher 2021 as a stand-alone, there was no mention that it was going to be discontinued. I can use it for as long as I want except there will not be any upgrades or security fixes. I don't have 365 at home, but the organisation I volunteer for does. They told me that after next year, Publisher won't be included with 365, so I can't share the newsletter I work on with anyone at their office. I will have to go back to using Word if I want them to be able to access my work. I was really annoyed when I found out about this decision by MS. There are obviously many people who this affects more than me, people who have been using Publisher for years and have tons of files. Shame on MS for doing this without pre-consultation with users. If there is a petition I will gladly sign.

I vehemently agree with you and support your position! We're in the same situation - myself for my small business which relies on Publisher and my husband at his workplace. It is egregious that Microsoft doesn't take surveys or reach out to existing customers to learn what their needs are - this is an unfortunate side-effect of rampant capitalism. In any case, I'd gladly participate in a petition. Can you provide any information about this?

Thank you and regards,

Linda C.

I just randomly found out about Publisher being discontinued in October 2026. I am devastated. I have used Publisher for over 10 years and while it isn't perfect, it works very well for me. I use it for creating quilt and sewing patterns, and I know Word would not work at all for what I do. I will have to start over from scratch, learning the new 'language' of whatever program I choose to replace Publisher. In the meantime, all my Publisher files will be, in effect, destroyed over time due to lack of support and updates and bug fixes. If there is any current information since March 2024, I would like to know about it. Thank you.

Thanks GameFiend1000 for your comments.

Sorry to hear of your experience with Publisher. However, many people have used Publisher successfully, and their experiences have been positive.

If there is frustration in using Publisher, it may be because the software uses a different concept than Word. In Publisher one works with text boxes. And you can format those with more options and settings, and one make the text flow from one text box to another. Publisher is vastly easier than any similar apps produced by Adobe. I used Adobe products in the past, and they were so difficult and cumbersome to use, I simply gave up.

Arguably, yes, you can create bulletins, cards, and booklets in Microsoft Word. Word's styling features are more advanced. I have used Word many times for such publications, and it works. In Word however you need to rely heavily on section breaks and column breaks, which makes formatting more challenging and time consuming. Of course, you can indeed use text boxes in Word instead of section and column breaks. Precise positioning of those text boxes is more difficult. Also, try getting the text to flow to from one text box to another text box. If there is a setting to do this in Word, where is it? Only a few weeks ago did we finally discover a very hidden setting in Word that lets one print pages in booklet format. It's so hard to find, most users will not know it even exists. We still have to do some testing to see how that setting works during printing.

Respectfully,

Ruperstland, Canada

I agree that the demise of Publisher is terrible news. Please do not just confine it to Office Pro. Converted my kids to the easier manipulation of information layouts for projects when they were in high school and they loved it and found it great.

Publisher is the best kept secret in the Microsoft suite but it has never been promoted. I have used it professionally (at work), for non-profit activities (home) and children for secondary school before moving on to university (at home in the past).