An Easy Reference for End of Life Dates

If you’ve listened to the security advice on this show, you know I recommend keeping your software up to date. However, at some point, developers will no longer update older software. Here’s why you shouldn’t use this old software, and how to find out what programs and what versions won’t be updated anymore.

For Personal Tech Media, this is Two Minute Tech. I’m Jim Herman.

Typically, any software product will have a designated amount of time that it will receive updates, and then a separate timeframe beyond that, where it will still receive security updates. Once the end of the security updates has passed, it is said to have reached its end of life date.

While the product you have will still work beyond that date, certain functions may not work with the more modern operating systems. If the product in question is an operating system, like Windows, the operating system may not run new programs without crashing or producing unexpected errors.

But beyond the compatibility issues, there’s a more critical issue with older software. Once a product no longer receives security updates, the developers won’t patch any issues discovered by malicious actors. That means if someone finds a security hole in the version of software you’re using, that person will be able to exploit that hole forever.

Most companies publish the end of life date for each version on their website. However, there’s a website that makes it very simple. Endoflife.date has a database of the end of life date for thousands of programs. Choose the app from the list and look for the version that you’re running. If you’re using a version that is no longer updated, upgrade it or look for an alternate program.