AOL's dial-up internet hangs up the phone

If you used the internet in the 90s, there's one sound that instantly takes you back. It's the combination of static, chirps and pings that you heard as your computer made its connection to the World Wide Web. It was an incredible time that saw a great shift in information. It opened up our homes, connected us and informed us, and mostly it was thanks to AOL.

After more than 30 years, though, AOL has confirmed it is ending its dial-up service. According to the BBC, the service, which only exists in the US and Canada, will finally cease on 30th September 2025.

AOL was the biggest name in dial-up internet. Launched in 1991, it once had over 30 million subscribers and nearly 40% of US internet users. It offered a reassuring base, from which you could access many tools, including online games, chat rooms, news sports and entertainment.

Free discs

Early users paid an hourly rate to be online, and search engines were in their infancy – Google didn't launch until 1998. It provided free trials on disks and then CD-ROM discs to let people try this new technology, which, by today's standards, was incredibly slow.

Ultimately, the birth of broadband and constant connections soon killed off most dial-up usage and today, fewer than 300,000 people in the US still use it. Today 4G and 5G data connections provide an easy way to connect where broadband is unavailable.

One of my biggest memories of using AOL is that the dial-up connection made your home phone line unavailable for calls. So, if you were using the internet, someone would just get an engaged tone if they tried to call. Parents across the globe cursed their kids for hogging that phone line, causing many to wait until the family had gone to bed to connect again.

While it's sad to see any service go, it brought us so much. As much as I miss that connection sound, I'm not ready to give up my full-fibre broadband or 5G connection for it