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1989 - 2025
AOL Dial-up
“Goodbye!”
- Birth year
- 1989
- Shutdown year
- 2025
- Lifespan
- 36 years
- Peak era
- 1995-2001
- Company
- AOL
- Category
- Websites
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On Video
Signing on to AOL over dial-up
Plays from YouTube when you press play. Views, length and date from YouTube, October 2026.
About This Video
- From:
- RetroHead92
- Added:
- July 18, 2012
- Length:
- 0:31
More Videos4 videos
What Was It?
For millions of families, AOL was the internet. You installed it from a CD that had arrived in the mail, listened to the modem scream, and were greeted by a voice announcing that you had mail. Chat rooms, keywords, buddy lists and parental controls all lived inside the same window.
America Online took that name in 1989 and became the largest online service in the United States, with more than 20 million subscribers by 2000. In 2001, at its peak, it bought Time Warner in the largest merger in American history.
Broadband ended dial-up's dominance quickly, but AOL kept its dial-up service running for decades. It was finally discontinued on September 30, 2025.
Things You Probably Forgot
- Free trial CDs arriving in the mail, again
- The modem handshake
- "You've got mail!"
- Chat rooms and AOL Keywords
- Getting kicked offline when someone picked up the phone
The Story
- 1989 Quantum Link was renamed America Online.
- 1995 AOL had about three million active users.
- 2000 It provided internet service to more than 20 million customers.
- 2001 AOL completed its merger with Time Warner.
- 2025 AOL discontinued its legacy dial-up service on September 30.
How It Died
AOL officially discontinued its legacy dial-up internet service on September 30, 2025, after years of declining subscribers.
What Replaced It?
Memories
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