14 DAY TRIAL // Diehard Windows phone fans have more or less gotten used to apps being pulled from their favorite platform, but every time a new such announcement makes the headlines, it’s pushing them even closer to Android or iOS.
This is what appears to be happening right now, as Starbucks is leaving Windows phones because of the same old reason: the market share of Microsoft’s mobile OS is shrinking to the point that it makes no sense to maintain apps here, so switching focus entirely to Android and iOS is what developers plan to do.
Ironically, Starbucks was one of the most anticipated and highly praised apps on Windows phones, and Microsoft itself used it as living proof of its and developers’ commitment to the operating system.
The official Starbucks app was late to the party, arriving on Windows phones with limited functionality, but Microsoft and Windows phone users still considered this an important milestone. One that was supposed to help save the smartphone operating system, that is.
Committed to Android and iOS
The official Starbucks app for Windows phones, however, has rarely been updated, and users complained of plenty of bugs, such as random crashes and the app not staying logged in.
As it happened every time a new app waved goodbye to Windows phones, users of the Starbucks app are recommended to switch to the mobile browser in order to connect to the service, though without support for some features, it’s not hard to figure out not everyone is going to do this.
“To continue using the Starbucks app on Windows, please go to apps.starbucks.com in the US, starbucks.ca in Canada, and starbucks.co.uk in the UK,” a text displayed when launching the app reads. A message displayed at the top of the screen reads “Failed to sign in, please try again!”
It goes without saying that the official Starbucks app will continue to run just fine and receive updates on Android and iOS, so Windows phone users who don’t want to give up on the service know what they have to do.