Microsoft Sets September 2028 End Date for Standalone Azure Communication Services

Microsoft has announced that Azure Communication Services will be retired as a standalone offering on September 30, 2028, with customers having two years to migrate impacted communications workloads to Microsoft Teams, Dynamics 365, Microsoft 365 services or other communications providers.

The change includes some of the best known ACS services like Email, SMS, WhatsApp messaging, Chat, Rooms, phone number services and Direct Routing. Technology calls in ACS go a different direction.

Microsoft says that the Voice and Video Calling SDK, Call Automation, Call Recording, Call Diagnostics, Audio Streaming and Closed Captions are not being completely retired, but will be subject to breaking changes.

After September 30, 2028, they will be supported for use with services linked to Microsoft Teams. (learn.microsoft.com) That difference is important to organizations that have built customer calling, contact center, notification, or messaging solutions on Azure Communication Services. Existing deployments continue to work.

Microsoft said that already deployed scenarios calling other already deployed scenarios can still run during the retirement period, and customers will continue to receive support, security updates and bug fixes, as per their Azure support plans, over the two-year transition. (learn.microsoft.com)

Azure Date of Retirement for Communication Services

Microsoft says retired ACS services will become unavailable on September 30, 2028. After this date, operations on APIs and SDKs for retired services might return errors, because the underlying service will no longer be supported.

Microsoft’s current general ACS retirement guide states that new customers will not be able to sign up to the ACS services listed for retirement effective October 23, 2026.

Customers with an ACS resource created prior to that date may continue using their existing resources during the transition period. Dynamics (learn.microsoft.com) 365 customers with product specific instructions. In the Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center documentation, there is a restriction on the acquisition of new ACS phone numbers that is effective September 30, 2026. Therefore, customers should read the migration documentation for the Microsoft product associated with their ACS deployment. (learn.microsoft.com)

What Is Azure Communication Services being retired?

At present, Microsoft categorizes the following services and SDKs as retired:

Calls stay, but the supported model is changing

Voice and video deserve separate treatment, as Microsoft’s retirement notice does not lump all calling components together with Email or SMS.

The calling components affected are:

• ACS Voice and Video Calling SDK
• Call Diagnostics ACS
• ACS Automated Call
• Audio Streaming ACS
• ACS Call Recorder –
• Closed Captioning ACS

These breaking changes are called by Microsoft. They may still be available after September 30, 2028, but will require one of Microsoft’s Teams-linked communication routes to be supported.

Supported paths include Teams Phone Extensibility, Teams Meeting Interoperability and Teams Click-2-Call for Teams Voice Apps, Microsoft lists. Applications will also need the newer versions of the SDKs, as appropriate. (learn.microsoft.com) Learn development teams, which is a different task from replacing a retired API. ACS Email application requires another mail service.

An ACS Calling application may be able to retain parts of its calling code while changing the surrounding telephony model, SDK version, identity setup or Teams connection.

Microsoft makes business calling more like Teams

Teams Phone Extensibility is a key part of Microsoft’s migration documentation for voice workloads. The Teams Calling Plan is one of the options for ACS Direct Offer customers listed by Microsoft.

If you already have your own session border controllers (SBCs) or SIP trunks, you can choose Teams Direct Routing. Another carrier-managed route is offered by Operator Connect. (learn.microsoft.com)

Teams Phone Extensibility can also help customer service applications that have to access Teams telephony. According to Microsoft’s documentation, Teams Phone model PSTN connectivity can be achieved using Calling Plans, Operator Connect, or Direct Routing. (learn.microsoft.com)

This gives organizations time to decide whether their existing communications design belongs inside Teams, Dynamics 365 or another provider’s communications service.

Where does ACS Email go?

The ACS Email will be retired September 30, 2028. Microsoft’s migration table lists Microsoft 365 High Volume Email and Exchange Online as Microsoft alternatives for internal high volume mail.

Both require a Microsoft 365 subscription. Microsoft’s ACS documentation lists Infobip and Telesign as third-party alternatives for requirements not met by those services. Companies (learn.microsoft.com) For those using ACS Email for application-generated messages, think about the kind of mail you send before you choose an alternative.

Different workloads Internal organization mail, mailbox-based communication, application-generated customer email. The migration inventory should include existing sending domains, authentication, suppression handling, delivery reporting, templates and application APIs.

It also requires a new way for SMS and WhatsApp customers.

ACS SMS is on the Microsoft retirement list. There is no direct Microsoft SMS replacement listed in the general ACS migration table.

It points users to communications providers such as Infobip and Telesign. (learn.microsoft.com)

Dynamics 365 Contact Center has its own set of supported options. Microsoft’s documentation for Current Dynamics lists Twilio or Infobip for SMS, while WhatsApp can be moved to supported provider arrangements including Twilio.

Existing Dynamics 365 installations that are already using supported provider configurations are not impacted in the same way as ACS-hosted SMS and WhatsApp configurations. (learn.microsoft.com) That makes channel inventory one of the first useful pieces of migration work. Prior to switching providers, teams should record each sending number, receiving number, country, messaging template, webhook, delivery callback, consent rule and application dependency.

Alternatives to Microsoft ACS Chat and Rooms

Microsoft Graph Chat APIs are a migration option for ACS Chat according to Microsoft, with the required Teams licensing.

Microsoft directs ACS Rooms customers to Teams Meeting interoperability and Microsoft Graph APIs. Organizations Before choosing the replacement design, anyone looking at custom meeting applications should consider identity management and participant behavior.

Microsoft is still working on scenarios for ACS-to-Teams meetings with external users being able to join Teams meetings from a custom app or website without being pushed into the standard Teams client.

Job Router has a route to Dynamics 365

ACS Job Router also needs to be decommissioned. Microsoft lists Dynamics 365 Contact Center as its Microsoft replacement route, and names Luware and Talkdesk among third-party alternatives in the retirement guide. (learn.microsoft.com) For contact centers, migration planning should encompass more than routing rules. The current routing design may affect queues, worker availability, skills, priorities, distribution policies, CRM records, reporting events and downstream application calls.

Existing ACS customers time to plan up

Microsoft is not asking existing customers to immediately shut down production ACS workloads. “Current services continue to be supported during the retirement period under the customer’s applicable Azure support arrangement,” the company says.

Existing calling scenarios can still run until September 30, 2028. (learn.microsoft.com) Microsoft recommends Dynamics 365 Contact Center customers in a similar fashion: there is no need to rush into production migration, but it is best to start dependency analysis and testing early enough to make the switch before the service deadline. (learn.microsoft.com) A good first step is to take inventory of the following:

• ACS Subscriptions and Resources
• Number type and phone numbers
• Email domains and sending applications
• SMS messaging numbers and countries
• Channels in WhatsApp
• SDK version number 1.
• Call Automation apps
• Recordings of calls
• Event Grid subscriptions
• Web hooks
• Session Border Controllers and SIP Trunks
• Chat and Rooms are working
• Job Router Queue
• UI Library Dependency
• Relationships in Dynamics 365
• team dependencies
• Links to track and invoice

Each dependency can then be matched to a Microsoft supported destination or another provider before moving production traffic.

Planning is crucial to move phone numbers

Phone numbers are a practical problem that telephony migrations have that software migrations do not.

Existing ACS customers can continue to acquire and port numbers during the transition, Microsoft says, under the terms laid out in its documentation. Number portability still has carrier requirements, geography and local rules. The (learn.microsoft.com) general ACS guide also warns customers to delete ACS phone numbers before deleting an ACS resource. Microsoft says charges can continue on orphaned numbers if the resource is deleted first, requiring a support ticket to fix the problem. (learn.microsoft.com) Organizations with customer-facing numbers may prefer staged number groups to a single cutover. ”That allows for routing tests, carrier validation and rollback checks before the rest of the production numbers move.”

Planning deadline pushed back to September 2028

Microsoft announced Azure Communication Services, which gave developers APIs to add calling, messaging, chat and email into their applications, without the standard Microsoft communications clients.

Today, Microsoft is breaking those workloads into more discrete destinations. ACS is on track to deprecate Email, SMS, WhatsApp messaging, Chat, Rooms, Direct Routing, direct ACS phone-number services, Job Router and the UI libraries.

Support calls on technology still supported under modified support terms for Microsoft Teams services.

The remaining two-year window provides organizations already on ACS time to audit applications, choose destination services, test SDK changes, move phone numbers in controlled groups and validate each communications channel before September 30, 2028.

It’s not to shut down ACS right now. It’s about pinpointing exactly which parts of an app depend on the services Microsoft has earmarked for retirement, and which calling components can continue to run under the Teams-linked model Microsoft will keep around after the deadline.