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AOL ends dial-up service [1]

['Rob Beschizza']

Date: 2025-09-30  

Announced only a few weeks ago but long in coming, AOL's dial-up internet service dies today. The "final screech" is nigh, writes Rob Wile, lamenting the modem's last gasp.

At its peak, AOL counted more than 20 million users and in 2000 became part of the largest corporate deal in history when it merged with Time Warner in a deal that gave the combined companies a value of approximately $350 billion. But as broadband internet became more accessible — and as a host of more sophisticated web browsers came on the scene — AOL began shedding users. In 2021, it was sold along with Yahoo — with which it had merged after both were acquired by Verizon — for $5 billion to the private equity giant Apollo.

With sadness I can verify that https://getonline.aol.com/dialup now redirects to the homepage. AOL isn't making a fuss; it didn't respond to NBC News's request for comment and the shutdown was only "announced" in a brief support note.

AOL routinely evaluates its products and services and has decided to discontinue Dial-up Internet. This service will no longer be available in AOL plans. As a result, on September 30, 2025 this service and the associated software, the AOL Dialer software and AOL Shield browser, which are optimized for older operating systems and dial-up internet connections, will be discontinued.

According to census data, 163,000 Americans still use dial-up, and Wile cites CNBC as finding only a "few thousand" AOL users among them. Some rural and remote users may not have other reasonable options, but there is some demand among retrogamers and nostalgiacs. If you can't find dial-up service, one Redditor suggests making your own: "it's a bit hardcore, but…"

A Linux computer (which could be an old Raspberry Pi), a serial port (which could be a USB converter) and a decent modem (even high-end Courier v.Everything modems are cheap now) are all you need on the "ISP" end. There will be a learning curve, though. I have a Courier v.Everything answering calls on my router (which is a PC Engines APU box, really a small 64-bit AMD computer). Since it's already the router, routing traffic from the dialup connection is trivial.

Just don't expect blistering 56k v.92 speeds. Once more, for old times' sake:

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[1] Url: https://boingboing.net/2025/09/30/aol-ends-dial-up-service.html

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