Facebook used to want to be a big part of business communication and efficiency, but today, Meta, the company that owns Facebook, will end a very important part of that story. Meta is shutting down Workplace, a version of Facebook that was made to help business teams and larger organizations talk to each other.
Our sources tell us that the company plans to make an official announcement later today. We have reached out to the company for confirmation. From what the sources say, things will go on as normal on the platform until the beginning of September 2025, or August 25. After that, until May 2026, you will only be able to read it. After that, the service will no longer be used at all.
A memo sent to Workplace customers says that the company suggests Workvivo, which is owned by Zoom, as a migration-ready option. Zoom bought Workvivo in 2023, which was another business communication tool. The whole Meta letter is below.
It’s Still Not Clear How Many Workers Will Be Affected By The Closing
Later, a source told us, “We are ending Workplace from Meta so we can focus on building AI and metaverse technologies that we believe will fundamentally change the way we work.” “For the next two years, we will give our Workplace customers the choice to switch to Zoom’s Workvivo product, which is Meta’s only official migration partner.” Since then, other news outlets like Bloomberg and Reuters have also added to the story. (continues below with the original)
The change ends the product’s ten-year run. The company had high hopes for the product to bring Facebook a new source of income, but it was eventually too weak to compete with Microsoft’s Slack and later Teams.
We haven’t had a clear plan for the section for a while, so this shouldn’t be a big surprise. We had even heard that after Covid, outside investment firms asked Meta to separate the division into its own company so that it could get outside funding.
A source said that Meta turned down the offer because Facebook and now Meta saw Workplace as a “strategic asset.” The reason for this wasn’t because Workplace gets as much money as Meta does from ads on Facebook and Instagram, but because it was important to show the market a more diverse side of the company. And it helped Meta make the case to other stakeholders about the wide range of services it provided. It showed regulators that Meta was more than just an overly powerful social network, and it showed businesses that Facebook could do more for them than just sell ads.
The Person Said, “It Helps Facebook And Meta Look Like Adults.”
It’s clear that the company is shifting its attention to AI, which could lead to more reorganizations in the future.
The basic idea for Workplace came from how Facebook used its main social network. There was already a more restricted version of Facebook that the company used for its own teams. It saw a chance to make that version available to business users as a product.
As a work in progress, it was called Facebook @ Work, and it was built by a group of people in London led by Lars Rasmussen, who helped make Google Maps and was now the head of tech at Facebook. He had been wanting to make a business service at Facebook for a long time, and this was his baby.
In the end, the product came out of beta as Workplace and Facebook built a number of third-party integrations because they saw a chance to give users more ways to be productive while still using Facebook for conversation.
Over time, Workplace was able to get some very important users, but there was an unexpected turn in the road that made things more difficult. Slack went popular and gained a lot of users, which led Microsoft to make Teams. In the beginning, Workplace tried to compete with these, but in the end, it gave up and teamed up with Teams for some features.
A lot of important people who worked on building Workplace left over time, and a source tells us that the product never really got better after Covid.
The source said that after the pandemic, “growth slowed down.” The source also said that the fact that the company is having a bit of an identity crisis right now—it’s not even called Facebook anymore, and Meta doesn’t really make much sense—“it also shows that it is being more decisive by killing all non-core projects.”
This Is What The Company Told Its Customers:
To The Boss At Work,
We’d like to let you know that we’ve made the tough choice to shut down Workplace from Meta in 2026.
We know that this choice will cause problems for the companies, groups, and partners that use Workplace every day. Our main goal is to make the change go as smoothly as possible.
Schedules
Based on our current plans, you can keep using Workplace normally until August 31, 2025. During this time, the account management and customer service teams will still be there to help you with any questions or issues you may have. On top of that, Meta will be cutting the price of Workplace by 50% starting September 1, 2024.
Workplace will be free from September 1, 2025, to May 31, 2026, but you will only be able to read and download current data. After that, you will no longer be able to access Workplace and your instance will be deleted.
Get Your Information Here
People who work for you can use the Download Your Information tool to get their info. This can be turned on in their Workplace settings. The Workplace API can be used to share data from your Workplace.
Also Read: New Eu Charges Have Been Brought Against Meta’s “consent or Pay” Data Grab
We understand that you may already have a technology partner, but Workvivo by Zoom is the only one that Meta recommends for transfer. We will be working with Zoom to offer more tools and services that will make the process easier for customers moving from Workplace to Workvivo.
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