Skype for Windows Phone does not run in the background

A couple of days ago, we reported that the Skype app was finally launched for Windows Phone. This was probably a long time coming ever since Microsoft acquired Skype, but here are some interesting facts that maybe you’d like to take a look at before you get all excited.

According to the folks at The Verge, they learnt that the Skype app will not work in the background. This means that unless you have your Skype app up and running in the foreground, you will not be able to receive calls. According to Skype, this is an issue in the Mango update of Windows Phone and that there’s nothing they can do for now, although personally we are hoping to see that change with the Apollo update.

So why not use push notifications instead? Well once again according to Skype, while push notifications are a way to launch the app and allow the user to receive calls while Skype is in the background, the process is too long for it to be effective. However it should be noted that this is the beta version of Skype, so perhaps the final build will see more improvements, either that or we can wait for Windows Phone 8 to drop and see what changes then.