• Stadia shuts down officially on  18th January 2023.
• All hardware and games purchased via Google and Stadia stores will be refunded.
• Stadia Pro users can continue to use the service until it shutters for free.

Stadia is dead, or rather its life on the internet is now on a timer and that timer runs out in January 2023.

Launched in November 2019, Stadia was Google’s foray into gaming but the internet was very hesitant about the service. This is because Google has a long history of cancelling projects before they’ve gotten off of the ground or soon after they’ve launched.

So why has Stadia met the same fate as Cameos and Google+? A lack of traction or rather, the service didn’t gain the traction that executives were hoping for.

Impressively though, Google is refunding all purchases made through the Google Store and the Stadia Store.

“We’re grateful to the dedicated Stadia players that have been with us from the start. We will be refunding all Stadia hardware purchases made through the Google Store, and all game and add-on content purchases made through the Stadia store. Players will continue to have access to their games library and play through January 18, 2023 so they can complete final play sessions. We expect to have the majority of refunds completed by mid-January, 2023,” vice president and general manager for Stadia, Phil Harrison wrote in a blog.

The VP goes on to say that the technology used in Stadia will be applied elsewhere like in YouTube, Google Play and the firm’s augmented reality efforts.

As for employees who worked on Stadia, “many” of them will move to other parts of Google, but Harrison was rather coy in revealing much more than that.

This announcement isn’t all that surprising when one considers that Google had reportedly shifted focus from its consumer business to operating Stadia as a while-label service where the likes of Peloton and AT&T could enlist Google to create cloud games.

Stadia Pro subscribers won’t have their subscription refunded but existing subscribers will be able to access the service at no cost until Stadia shuts down.