All users will be moved to Outlook.com, Microsoft says

Feb 19, 2013 14:46 GMT  ·  By

Now that Outlook.com is out of preview and is available to all users around the world, the company is getting ready to completely retire Hotmail, one of the most popular email services ever released.

The company announced the decision in a blog post, revealing that it expects all Hotmail users to make the switch to Outlook.com by summer.

“The upgrade is seamless and instant for people who use Hotmail. Everything from their @hotmail.com email address, password, messages, folders, contacts, rules, vacation replies, etc. will stay the same, with no disruption in service. And we won't ever make you switch your email address to an @outlook.com address if you don't want to,” the company said.

Once you log in with your Hotmail username and password at Outlook.com, your account is automatically enabled, so the transition is basically pretty smooth.

Of course, don’t be too surprised if Microsoft might lose a handful of users, as many Hotmail consumers have already expressed their frustration towards the company’s decision to retire the service.