Xamarin is end of life: what to do with your app

If your mobile app is built on Xamarin, it is running on a framework Microsoft stopped supporting on 1 May 2024. The app still works, which is exactly why it is easy to ignore. It is also why it is a problem you want to find before your users, or the app stores, find it for you.

Here is what end of life actually means for a Xamarin app, why it collides with the stores, the path Microsoft points you to, and what it costs to take it.

What end of support actually means

Microsoft's position is not ambiguous. Support ended on 1 May 2024 for all Xamarin SDKs, including Xamarin.Forms. End of support means Microsoft no longer provides fixes, updates, or technical assistance. That includes security fixes. Whatever state your Xamarin app was in on 30 April 2024 is the best state it will ever be in.

It also means the framework is frozen in time. The final versions Xamarin targets are Android API 34 and the Xcode 15 SDK (iOS 17). No newer platform APIs are coming. For a phone in someone's pocket, that is a slow leak: the operating system keeps moving, and the app cannot follow.

Why it collides with the app stores

This is where the frozen framework stops being a tidiness issue and starts costing you customers. Both stores enforce a moving floor, and Xamarin sits below it.

On Apple it is already terminal. Xamarin's last iOS build target is the Xcode 15 (iOS 17) SDK, and App Store Connect has required the iOS 26 SDK for uploads since 28 April 2026. A Xamarin iOS app cannot be uploaded at all. It is frozen exactly as it stands, with no way to ship a change.

On Android the trap is quieter. Xamarin's final target, Android API 34, still meets Google Play's floor for an existing app you leave alone. But the moment you need to ship an update, even a security fix, you are held to the higher bar that new submissions and updates must meet, and Xamarin cannot reach it. The floor rises every year. We wrote about that cycle in the Google Play deadline piece. The net of it: a Xamarin app is one you cannot patch, and one the stores will eventually drop.

The path Microsoft points to: .NET MAUI

The supported route is not a side-grade to another vendor. Xamarin.Forms evolved into .NET Multi-platform App UI, and Microsoft is explicit that existing Xamarin.Forms projects should be migrated to .NET MAUI. Xamarin.Android, Xamarin.iOS and Xamarin.Mac have been folded into .NET itself since .NET 6, as .NET for Android, iOS and Mac.

For an app owner, the useful part is that this is a migration, not a rewrite. The business logic, the C# and the .NET libraries largely carry across. The work concentrates in the user-interface layer and anywhere the original team leaned on Xamarin-specific pieces like custom renderers.

We have done this on production apps: migrated Xamarin to .NET MAUI, and where it suits the product, to React Native. Message us to find out how we migrated customers to MAUI or React Native.

What it costs

The honest answer is that it depends, and the things it depends on are knowable. The size of the app, how many custom renderers and platform hacks it carries, how current its third-party libraries are, and how cleanly the original team separated logic from interface. A small, well structured app is a contained project. A large one that has drifted for years is a bigger one.

The comparison that matters is not migration against zero. It is migration against the cost of an app that cannot be updated, cannot be secured, and quietly stops reaching new users. A free check is the cheapest way to turn that open-ended worry into a fixed number.

Then do not let it happen again

Migrating off Xamarin is worth doing once. Doing it again in five years because the new framework also drifted is not. The way you avoid the repeat is to keep the app on a supported, current stack from the day it ships, with the platform updates handled as routine rather than as a rescue. That is what App Care is for: we run the mobile apps you have already paid to build, so they stay current and never quietly fall out of the stores. Brisbane-based.

Sources

1. Microsoft, "Xamarin Support Policy", .NET. Support ended 1 May 2024 for all Xamarin SDKs including Xamarin.Forms; end of support means Microsoft no longer provides fixes, updates, or technical assistance; Android API 34 and the Xcode 15 SDK are the final targets; migrate Xamarin.Forms to .NET MAUI and Xamarin.Android/iOS to .NET for Android/iOS. https://dotnet.microsoft.com/en-us/platform/support/policy/xamarin
2. Google, "Meet Google Play's target API level requirement", Android Developers. New apps and updates must target Android 15 (API level 35); existing apps stay available to new users if they target Android 14 (API level 34) or higher. https://developer.android.com/google/play/requirements/target-sdk
3. Apple, "SDK minimum requirements", Upcoming Requirements, Apple Developer. Since 28 April 2026, apps uploaded to App Store Connect must be built with Xcode 26 using an iOS 26 SDK. https://developer.apple.com/news/upcoming-requirements/