A banner in the app has informed users that Microsoft Paint 3D will be retired on 4 November 2024. This is the end of its seven-year life. Paint 3D was rolled out as the Microsoft Paint modern equivalent with a main focus on 3D modeling.
Even with new advanced features, such as layers and transparency effects, Paint 3D was criticized. People still wanted to use the classic Microsoft Paint enough that Microsoft decided to continue running both versions. In 2023, Microsoft updated Paint to include some of the key features of Paint 3D, including layers and auto background removal.
Besides that, Paint has incorporated an AI-driven feature called Cocreator for Microsoft Copilot users. It puts Paint at the same level as Paint 3D. It is henceforth justified to kill Paint 3D since all its features are on Paint.
Microsoft Paint remains the very basic tool it always has been under Windows. Certainly, it is nowhere near something like GIMP, but it does pretty much everything most people want. Thus, this move to consolidate features within Paint and retire Paint 3D makes sense.
