Edgar Cervantes / Android Authority
TL;DR
- Microsoft Lens PDF scanner will be retired on Android and iOS later this year.
- The phase-out begins in September, with scanning disabled after December 15, 2025.
- Microsoft is pushing users toward its 365 Copilot app, which lacks some Lens features.
One of Microsoft’s most popular mobile utilities is heading for the chopping block. The Lens PDF scanner has long been a go-to for quickly turning documents and whiteboards into shareable files. Nevertheless, it will be retired on Android and iOS later this year.
As reported by Bleeping Computer, Microsoft says the phase-out will start in mid-September 2025, when new installs from the Apple App Store and Google Play Store will be disabled. The app will disappear from both stores by mid-November, and you’ll lose the ability to create new scans entirely after December 15, 2025.
Previously known as Office Lens, the Microsoft Lens app can turn printed or handwritten text into PDFs, Word, PowerPoint, and Excel files, and has been downloaded over 50 million times on Google Play alone. It’s well-liked too, with nearly a million reviews averaging 4.8 stars on Android and the same rating on iOS.
Existing scans will remain viewable in the MyScans folder after the cutoff date, but Microsoft is nudging people toward its Microsoft 365 Copilot app instead. That app offers many of Lens’s core features, though it lacks some popular extras.
Lens’s demise is part of a broader Microsoft spring-cleaning effort. In recent months, the company has deprecated password autofill in the Microsoft Authenticator app, announced the end of Microsoft Publisher in 2026, and scrapped Paint 3D from the Microsoft Store.
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