--- title: "The Browser Company Will Shut Down Arc on December 22" date: 2026-10-22 author: "Sofia Ramirez" featured_image: "https://sqmagazine.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/arc-browser-shutdown-confirmed.jpg" categories: - name: "Technology" url: "/technology.md" tags: - name: "News" url: "/tag/news.md" --- # The Browser Company Will Shut Down Arc on December 22 The Browser Company said on October 22, 2026, that its Arc browser will stop working on December 22. Every Arc account will be deactivated that day, and its personal data deleted within **30 days**. ## At a Glance - The Browser Company stopped new Arc sign-ups with the announcement, though existing members can keep browsing until the shutdown. - Arc Search on iOS and Android loses Browse for Me, sign-in and tab sync next month. - Arc for macOS and Windows stops working in two months, and the Android app gets pulled from Google Play and from devices. - Atlassian bought The Browser Company for $610 million last year, and the company now puts its whole security team on Dia. The data deadline matters most for people still using Arc. Once accounts close, the company says it can no longer identify or retrieve Arc user data for data requests. Anyone who wants to keep tabs, Spaces or logins has to export them or move them into Dia first. > We’ve decided to sunset Arc on December 22, 2026. That’s not an easy sentence to write. We spent years building Arc and celebrating each and every release along the way: we have so much pride and love for what we made alongside the Arc community. Our priority is to deliver best-in-class security for our members. Keeping a browser secure takes constant, dedicated work that is only increasing in the age of AI. Dia was built from the ground up to meet today’s security standards, so that’s where our engineering and security teams will focus moving forward. We’ve worked to make switching to @diabrowser as easy as possible for Arc members. Here’s how: · Your passwords, bookmarks, extensions and history come over to Dia seamlessly. · Spaces, Folders, and Tab Groups are in Dia and import over with your data intact. · Dia now surpasses Arc benchmarks in stability, speed, and security. · The browser features you use in Arc are free in Dia, and the AI is optional. Thank you for using Arc, for pushing us to make it better, and for building alongside us. The team that made Arc is the same team behind Dia, and some of our most ambitious work is just ahead. We’d love for you to be there with us when it lands. > > — Arc (@arcinternet) [October 22, 2026](https://x.com/arcinternet/status/2113301454597640570?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw) ## The Browser Company sets a staged Arc shutdown The company’s [farewell page](https://arc.net/) lays out the wind-down in dated steps: - **October 22:** New accounts are blocked. The latest Arc build adds a full data export and a smoother import into Dia. - **November 23:** Arc Search on iOS and Android loses Browse for Me and other AI features, plus sign-in and sync. - **December 22:** Arc goes dark on macOS and Windows, accounts are deactivated, and Arc Search leaves Google Play. The two mobile apps don’t end the same way. Arc Search on iOS keeps running as a lite browser after its AI features switch off. The Android version gets removed from the Play Store and from devices where it’s already installed. Switching to [Dia, the company’s AI-focused browser](https://sqmagazine.co.uk/dia-browser-launch-mac-ai-tools/), is the route the company wants users to take. Dia imports passwords, history, tabs, bookmarks, extensions, Spaces and Folders during sign-up, with Spaces becoming Profiles and Folders becoming Tab Groups. The company says the Arc features people rely on are free in Dia, and the AI is optional. ## Security work moves to Dia Security is the main reason the company gives. “**Keeping a browser secure takes constant, dedicated work**,” the farewell note said, adding that the load keeps growing in the age of AI. Dia was built for current security standards, the company wrote, so its engineering and security teams will work there from now on. Atlassian owns **The Browser Company** after last year’s acquisition. Arc development had already stopped moving forward in May 2025, yet the browser still needed security fixes to stay safe. Ending it lets one security team concentrate on one desktop browser instead of splitting its hours. Arc isn’t the only browser to fold this year. OpenAI shut down its [Atlas browser](https://sqmagazine.co.uk/openai-chatgpt-atlas-browser-launch/) in favor of the in-app browser inside ChatGPT. The farewell page leaves several gaps. It doesn’t say how many people still use Arc or whether its code will ever be released. It also doesn’t say how long the lite iOS browser will get updates, or whether that app will eventually leave the App Store. ## What’s Next? Arc users moving to Dia can run the import now from Dia’s menu. Those heading elsewhere can export their tabs from Arc’s Advanced settings, which saves them as a list of links. The page only describes that export in terms of tabs. Checking how saved passwords will move helps reduce the risk of losing them at the cutoff. The next marker is November 23, when Arc Search loses its AI features and sync. Desktop Arc keeps getting basic updates until December 22, and the deletion window for account data opens the same day.