Microsoft is removing Android, iOS, and Windows support from Visual Studio Application Insights

Microsoft today announced that it will be cutting support for Android, iOS, Windows Store, and Windows Phone app in the Application Insights tool for its Visual Studio integrated development environment (IDE). Application Insights, which offers analytics on performance and usage, will stop accepting new apps for those platforms on April 15, and on June 15, the feature will stop showing data for apps on those platforms.

The move may come as a surprise to some developers, as Application Insights was introduced less than a year ago — it’s still in preview — and it doesn’t offer exactly the same features as HockeyApp. But in the user forum for Application Insights, Microsoft representatives had been notifying people that this sort of transition was on the way.

“We realize this transition is a turning point from our previous strategy and may cause some additional work for you,” Microsoft Application Insights group program manager Thomas Dohmke wrote in a blog post. “Our goal with this shift is to provide you with the best experiences possible for you to distribute, test, monitor and manage your mobile apps. HockeyApp is the solution to provide you this experience.”

Microsoft acquired HockeyApp in 2014, after Apple bought the team behind TestFlight. HockeyApp lets developers release beta tests of apps and then receive feedback and crash reports.

Microsoft could be in for a similar transition of developer tools with Apache Cordova, following its acquisition of Xamarin earlier this year.

Certain data that integrate with the Application Insights software development kits (SDKs) will work with HockeyApp SDKs, Dohmke wrote, adding that Visual Studio Application Insights will still work for web apps.

Update on June 14: Microsoft has pushed back the date when Application Insights for mobile apps will stop working; now that date is July 15, but only for certain functions, Shiva Sivakumar, principal group program manager for Application Insights, wrote in a blog post.

Update on August 30: The HockeyApp Bridge App for showing data from HockeyApp in Application Insights is now available, Application Insights program manager Evgeny Ternovsky wrote in a blog post.