Blackberry is warning users that services for its legacy BlackBerry OS devices is ending January 4, 2022.

BlackBerry was once king among smartphones, before the iPhone hit the scene. Between iOS and Android, Blackberry quickly lost market share. The company’s homegrown BlackBerry OS just couldn’t compete, prompting it to adopt Android. The company also pivoted from a hardware to a software company, licensing the rights to make BlackBerry-branded devices to outside companies. Even those devices, however, ran Android.

With that pivot complete, BlackBerry is sunsetting its BlackBerry OS services as of January 4, 2022. As a result, many common functions will stop working, according to the company.

Today BlackBerry is focused on providing intelligent security software and services to enterprises and governments around the world. Since pivoting to an enterprise software and cybersecurity company, we have received questions about our plans to provide ongoing support for BlackBerry 7.1 OS and earlier and BlackBerry 10 devices. In 2017, we committed to providing at least two more years of support for BlackBerry 10 and at least two years of BlackBerry network access for BBOS devices. 

On January 4, 2022, devices running on these service offerings through either carrier or Wi-Fi connections will no longer reliably function, including for data, phone calls, SMS and 9-1-1 functionality. We have chosen to extend our service until then as an expression of thanks to our loyal partners and customers.

The termination of these service offerings and infrastructure will also impact functionality for applications such as Enhanced Sim Based Licensing (ESBL) / Identity Based Licensing (IBL), BlackBerry hosted email addresses, BlackBerry Link, BlackBerry Desktop Manager, BlackBerry Blend, BlackBerry Protect (allows consumers to lock, locate or wipe BBOS, BlackBerry 10 devices remotely. There is no impact to the new BlackBerry Protect which is an AI-based endpoint security solution).