Paint 3D is a drawing program that was added to Windows 10 with the Creator's Update last year and is intended as a successor to the familiar MS Paint program. Microsoft announced in 2017 that it will not continue to develop the original Paint, which has been around for almost 35 years, and that it will probably disappear. Yet the original Paint is still there, but for how long?
Microsoft's new Paint looks more modern and has many more features, including working with 3D. Why would anyone want to use that old, simple drawing program? It is probably the simplicity of Paint that many users still like. Make a drawing quickly, without fuss. According to Microsoft, Paint was still being used by approximately 100 million people per month in 2017.
This may be the reason that Microsoft has not yet pulled the plug on the old version of the drawing program, even though it was planned for a future update of Windows 10. Perhaps the company itself came to the conclusion that the successor never would match the ease of use of classic Paint.
Microsoft therefore decided that the drawing software will continue to exist for a while, but will no longer receive updates. And so it happened: the program exists to this day, just like the classic card game Patience can still be found on a Windows 10 system.
However, the rumors have flared up again in recent weeks. When starting Paint, users were previously notified that the old version would be replaced by Paint 3D, but that it would still be possible to download the classic Paint from the Microsoft Store. With the May 2019 update of Windows 10, or version 1903, this message disappeared, which immediately led to questions. Will Microsoft Paint be replaced by Paint 3D and the classic, familiar drawing program will disappear?
Fans turned to Twitter and got an answer from Brandon LeBlanc, a senior program manager at Microsoft. "MS Paint will be available in 1903. The [program] will remain in Windows 10," LeBlanc wrote on Twitter. And with that, peace seems to have returned for the time being among fanatical illustrators.
