Evernote Kills Off Skitch For Windows, Android And iOS — But Retains Mac App

Evernote bought popular annotation app Skitch back in 2011 and, after incurring the wrath of loyal users for a series of unpopular updates, it is finally saying goodbye to it for good after announcing that it will end support for almost all versions of the service.

“As part of our promise to focus on improving the core Evernote experience, we are ending support for several… standalone apps,” Evernote said in a statement.

Skitch is the highest profile casualty, but Evernote’s Clearly reading extension and its Pebble app will keep it company in the app after-life. Evernote Food, the company’s dedicated recipe app, was shuttered at the end of September.

Evernote said it is ending support for Skitch for Windows, Windows Touch, iOS, and Android on January 22. That means that they will no longer be available for download after that date. Each version will continue to work for existing users but, because there is no longer a team or resources dedicated to each product, “external changes like updates to your operating system or browser may break features or functionality at any point in the future,” Evernote admitted.

Slight caveat: Evernote said it will continue to offer Skitch for Mac for download and also provide support, too. (Presumably that’s down to its sheer popularity, but it remains to be seen how long it will live on for.)

The move is sure to further anger any Skitch users who are left using the product — things haven’t exactly been smooth under Evernote’s ownership — but the company downplayed these closures, saying that the staple features are already baked into its core service. (We’ve heard this argument before and it rarely assuages disappointed users.)

We’ve incorporated many of the best features of Skitch and Clearly in our core applications. Skitch users will find nearly identical annotation functionality in the Evernote Windows and iOS apps. And the article simplification features from Clearly are available in our Web Clipper. People with Pebble watches can find similar Evernote features with the Powernoter app.

Improving the core experience is one argument for shutting down these apps, but another is that is that Evernote — a company that is in crisis following the departure of long-time CEO Phil Libin and exit of other execs like COO Linda Kozlowski this year — is cutting its costs in the wake of faltering subscription numbers and giving its core app, which has barely advanced in terms of features in recent times.

January 22 is the deadline for getting these apps if you want them. But, be warned, they will be living on borrowed time going forward.