Microsoft Lens is Losing its Job to AI

The Microsoft Lens app for Android and iPhone began life as Office Lens for Windows Phone, but whatever the name, it’s finally heading off to retirement: Microsoft will soon remove the app from the Apple App Store and Google Play Store and recommend that users turn to the Microsoft 365 Copilot app instead.

“The Microsoft Lens app will be retired from iOS and Android devices starting September 15, 2025,” a Microsoft Support document explains. “After November 15, Microsoft Lens will no longer be supported. Users can continue to use the scanning capability in the app until December 15, 2025. After that date, creating new scans in the Lens app will no longer be possible. However, users can continue to access their previous scans as long as the app remains installed on their device. Microsoft Lens will be removed from App store and Google Play Store on November 15, 2025.”

Well, that’s a confusing mess of dates. But long story short, it’s going away, and Microsoft recommends that users transition to the Microsoft 365 Copilot app and its built-in scanning feature.

Office Lens debuted in 2014 on Windows Phone, but it was ported to Android and iPhone in 2015 before being renamed to Microsoft Lens in 2021. It’s a single-purpose scanning app that works with documents, whiteboards, business cards, and more, can convert handwriting to text, and images to tables, and it has all kinds of little niceties like straightening scans and removing shadows, and it can export its results to various Microsoft and third-party apps and services. It’s possibly Microsoft’s highest-rated mobile app of all time.

Those who do transition to the Microsoft 365 Copilot app can access their Lens-created scans from Create > My Creations. But Microsoft also notes that the following Microsoft Lens features aren’t available in the Microsoft 365 Copilot app:

• Save directly to OneNote, PowerPoint, or Word
• Scanning business cards to save to OneNote
• Read out loud
• Immersive Reader integration