Microsoft Quietly Depreciates WordPad, to Remove It in Future Windows Releases

Almost 28 years after WordPad was released and bundled with Windows 95, the native and free word processor has been quietly depreciated by Microsoft.

This means Microsoft will stop the development of WordPad, and future versions of the Windows operating system will no longer have it installed by default. On September 1, Microsoft added an entry to its Deprecated features for Windows client documents.

WordPad is no longer being updated and will be removed in a future release of Windows. We recommend Microsoft Word for rich text documents like .doc and .rtf and Windows Notepad for plain text documents like .txt.Microsoft

Though Microsoft did not specify which Windows version will be the first to be released without WordPad, it will likely be Windows 12, considering it's supposed to be the next major Windows release. As of now, Windows 12 is scheduled to be rolled out in fall 2024.

WordPad's Removal Isn't a Surprise - Here's Why

Microsoft's decision to depreciate WordPad doesn't really come as a surprise. It was already made optional in 2020 when the company released the Windows 10 Insider Build 19551 update.

This change was then rolled out in stable Windows builds, too, allowing users to uninstall the word processor via the control panel.

For the past several years, the tech giant has focused on its two other word processors instead - Notepad and Word.

It's also worth noting that Microsoft stopped updating WordPad since Windows 7. The app received its last major update over a decade ago, with the release of Windows 7's new Ribbon UI in 2007.

Microsoft didn't offer any explanation behind its decision to remove WordPad. While it's nowhere as popular as the other word processors, it does serve basic purposes.

The only lightweight Microsoft app suitable for writing notes with screenshots and images, WordPad doesn't require an internet connection or any powerful hardware. In addition to images, users can also embed Excel sheets and graphs.

Although WordPad can open various file formats, including .DOCX, it defaults to the Rich Text Format while saving with the option to save as a text file or some other open file formats instead. The program often warns it might fail to ingest or save all the features encoded into documents by other file formats.

The word processor lacks commonly needed features like a word count display, table creation, or a spellchecker.

Its set of features made WordPad something between a full-fledged word processor and a barebones text editor that doesn't add any unwanted formatting to text - something developers loved. Despite its limitations, it doesn't leave much scope for complaints considering it's offered free of cost.

Plenty of Free Alternatives

Not many people would miss WordPad, considering its low popularity and the lack of several major functionalities. Besides, there are plenty of free alternatives with a lot more features.

Microsoft's online version of Word is free, and so are other popular word processors like Google Workspaces, Dropbox Paper, and Zoho Writer.

Users who'd prefer an offline alternative that doesn't require creating an account can use LibreOffice, ApacheOpenOffice, etc. However, some users expressed their discontent over the removal of the free word processor.

The post Microsoft Quietly Depreciates WordPad, to Remove It in Future Windows Releases appeared first on The Tech Report.