Microsoft-branded mice and keyboards are going away after 40 years

Enlarge / Microsoft's "green-eye" mouse, the first Microsoft-branded mouse the company sold. (credit: Microsoft)

If I asked you to name Microsoft's best-known and longest-lived product, you'd almost certainly say "Windows." But another one of the company's products has been on the market for even longer: its mice.

Microsoft started selling its first computer mice in 1983, a year or two before the Macintosh and other computers made pointing devices standard-issue and two years before the first version of Windows was released. The Microsoft Natural Keyboard followed in 1994. Since then, the company has offered a range of Microsoft-branded PC accessories, from successful ones like the Microsoft Ergonomic Keyboard to short-lived experiments like Microsoft SideWinder gamepads and joysticks.

Microsoft-made mice and keyboards aren't going away, but the Microsoft brand name is. The company told The Verge that it will stop selling Microsoft-branded keyboards, mice, and other accessories following a series of layoffs that affected its hardware division. The company will refocus its efforts on higher-end Surface-branded keyboards and mice, which represent just a tiny fraction of all the accessories Microsoft currently sells.

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