WHY Blackberry mobile's demise? Millions formerly owned it, but it is currently shutting down all of its legacy services.

Blackberry released its first handheld gadget, a two-way pager, in 1999. Since then, the company has seen it all: its growth, decline, and eventual demise. In the early 2000s, Nokia and Blackberry were the most popular cellular phone brands; however, the introduction of Apple's iPhones in the year 2007 put both of these brands out of business.

Blackberry introduced mobile phones such as the Curve Bold, Pearl, and others in the second half of the 2000s, and they quickly became popular among both corporate and regular customers.

Blackberry was notable not just for its QWERTY keyboard, but also for programs like Blackberry Messenger (BBM), which were immensely popular, especially among teenagers. The ability to send and receive emails, text messages, and access the internet while on the go made the gadgets popular among business people.

Blackberry tried a full-touch screen phone, the BlackBerry Storm, in late 2008 to compete with the iPhone, which had been released a year before, but the device's failure owing to poor performance forced Blackberry to return to full QWERTY keyboard phones, even on later touch-screen smartphones.

The iPhone 4's arrival in 2010 signalled the end of Blackberry's reign as the most popular smartphone in the United States. Although, due to its products aimed mostly at corporations and business professionals, Blackberry did not see iPhones and Android-based phones as a threat. Users, on the other hand, began to notice what the Blackberry lacked and began to move to iPhones or early Android phones.

One of the main reasons for Blackberry's demise was a lack of innovation, since the business was unable to compete with iPhones' full-touch displays. Both iOS and Android-based phones provided customers with a plethora of applications for day-to-day use; however, Blackberry did not.

Blackberry's front and back cameras were also underwhelming. When Apple and Android-based handsets began to provide higher quality front and back cameras, Blackberry did not consider improving its game and remained to offer basic camera features.

The company discontinued producing cellphones based on its own operating system after failing to fulfil market expectations. It began releasing Android-based devices.

It announced a partnership with TCL of China in 2016 to design and manufacture BlackBerry hardware, with TCL providing the software. These phones used the Android operating system, which provided users with apps and customization options while also improving security.

The BlackBerry Key2 was the most recent BlackBerry phone to hit the market. Since then, no new smartphones have been released. And now, with the declaration that software support and legacy services on its handsets will be discontinued on January 4, 2022, the business has officially halted its smartphone operations. Legacy services and software, whether on Wi-Fi or cellular networks, will no longer function, according to the release. Users with vintage Blackberry smartphones running BlackBerry 7.1 OS and older versions, BlackBerry 10 software, BlackBerry Playbook OS 2.1 and prior versions will be unable to use their devices.

These devices are fairly ancient, and Blackberry has sustained them for a longer period of time than stated. As a result, the number of people who will be affected will be minimal.

Users who are still using these devices will be unable to access data, make phone calls, send SMS, or use emergency services.