According to The Verge, Google notified Microsoft of its plans to discontinue support for ActiveSync on the Gmail platform last year, and has recently notified Microsoft that the cut-off is coming on Jan 30, despite Microsoft’s efforts to get a 6-month extension from Google. ActiveSync is widely used to sync calendar and contact data from Gmail to Windows and iOS devices. Microsoft has noted that the Windows Phone OS will support CardDAV and CalDAV, which are the protocols used currently for synching on Android devices, in a future update of Windows Phone OS, but the update release data has not been announced yet.

What this means for you:

If you use Gmail as your primary calendar and contact management system, and you are syncing contacts and calendar data to a Windows Phone or an iPhone, you will lose the ability to sync up your data between phone and the cloud for an unknown length of time once Google drops support for ActiveSync – Gizmodo projects it could be as long as six months time. If you need this functionality, start considering alternatives ASAP!