Microsoft is closing Mixer and releasing Ninja and Shroud from their contracts

Microsoft is closing its Mixer streaming service and transitioning all users to Facebook Gaming, it’s announced.

From July 22, all Mixer sites and apps will redirect users to Facebook Gaming. Mixer Partners will be granted partner status with Facebook Gaming, and the platform will honour and match all existing Partner agreements “as closely as possible,” according to Microsoft.

However, the major streamers locked into exclusivity deals with Mixers – including Tyler “Ninja” Blevins and Michael “Shroud” Grzesiek — will be released from their contracts, Facebook told The Verge.

UPDATE: Ninja and Shroud reportedly received payouts in the tens of millions following Microsoft’s decision to close Mixer and release them from their exclusivity contracts.

ORIGINAL STORY CONTINUES: In a statement published on the Xbox website, Head of Xbox Phil Spencer said the service had failed to grow in line with its expectations.

“Ultimately, the success of Partners and streamers on Mixer is dependent on our ability to scale the service for them as quickly and broadly as possible,” he wrote.

“It became clear that the time needed to grow our own livestreaming community to scale was out of measure with the vision and experiences we want to deliver to gamers now, so we’ve decided to close the operations side of Mixer and help the community transition to a new platform.”

Mixer was launched by Microsoft as Beam in 2016 and later rebranded.

Microsoft has pushed Mixer aggressively in 2019 and invested millions to poach streaming stars Ninja and Shroud from the Amazon’s rival Twitch platform.

Microsoft reportedly paid in the region of $50 million to lure Tyler ‘Ninja’ Blevins from Twitch to Mixer in August 2019.

Signing Ninja, who had some 14 million followers on Twitch, marked a huge coup for the platform as it attempted to compete with streaming giants Twitch and YouTube.

Commenting on the news, Ninja tweeted: “I love my community and what we built together on Mixer. I have some decisions to make and will be thinking about you all as I make them.”