End of Microsoft support for NAV: What are your options?

As of 10 January 2023, all versions of Dynamics NAV (formerly known as Navision) will move out of Mainstream Support. Dynamics NAV 2013 and 2013 R2 will also be out of Extended Support. In this blog, we take a look at what this means, and what the options are for businesses who are still using NAV and who haven’t migrated to Business Central yet.

NAV Support Lifecycle

With NAV, Microsoft’s lifecycle policy has been to support each version of the solution for 10 years. The first five years are Mainstream Support, and the final five are Extended Support.

• Mainstream Support: the product receives new features, security updates and non-security updates.
• Extended Support: the product only receives security updates.

As you can see from the table below, on 10 January 2023, Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2018 will be last version of NAV to go out of Mainstream Support and into Extended Support. Thereafter, your NAV instance will only receive security updates until the Extended Support period ends. After that, no version of NAV will receive any updates of any kind.

What are the options for Dynamics NAV users?

If you are a Dynamics NAV user, there are a number of options available to you:

1. Rely on the technical support of a proactive NAV Support Partner – If your NAV installation is heavily customised, the option to change or upgrade your ERP to one in Mainstream Support would be a very difficult one. In this case, it is important to have a reliable and proactive NAV Support Partner, such as TVision Technology, who will work with you to extend the life of your NAV product.

If you decide to go for this option, there are a number of risks to be aware of:

• With a legacy ERP, such as NAV, it is significantly more challenging to integrate with new technologies, such as external 3^rd party solutions. It is also more difficult for you to benefit from Power Automate, Power Apps, and Teams.
• As your ERP solution ages and moves out of Mainstream Support, there is the risk that it no longer conforms to current financial regulations. Auditors will want to look at how you manage the risk to your business of unsupported software.
• Your hardware may no longer be able to support your NAV software.
• As your ERP gets older, the possibility of it crashing increases. This could lead to unexpected downtime for your business, which could have an impact on productivity and profitability.

2. Upgrade your ERP to Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central – For users of Dynamics NAV, the most obvious product to upgrade to is Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central. Business Central is the next version of Dynamics NAV and the newest ERP from Microsoft. It is a revolutionary cloud-based business management software that promises to transform your business.

Benefits of upgrading to Business Central include:

• Seamless integration with the Microsoft stack
• Moving to cloud-based software means that with Business Central you can access it at any time and from anywhere with a web client.
• With Business Central’s monthly subscription fee, you can easily add or remove users as needed when using the NCE payment model.
• It also has extensive functionality that grows with you as your business grows.
• Business Central is governed by Microsoft’s Modern Lifecycle Policy. This means that there are continuous service updates, as well as a major update to the product every six months, in April and October.

Want to find out more?

Contact us if you are on NAV and are looking for a new and reliable Support Partner to help you extend the life of your NAV product.

If you want to know more about Microsoft Business Central and how TVision could help you upgrade, download our white paper, Why move from NAV to Business Central? You are also feel free to contact us to arrange a demo to see how moving from NAV to Business Central could be the right business move for you.