EA forces discontinuation of Origin and pushes new 64-bit launcher

Do you own games from the publisher EA, such as "FIFA", "The Sims", "Battlefield", "Apex Legends", "Dragon Age" or "Mass Effect"? Then you know the EA Origin game launcher. You need the launcher to start these games. If you rarely play EA games, this news might concern you: EA is discontinuing Origins on 17 April 2025. Instead, you will need the newer "EA App" launcher to continue using your games.

EA justifies the change with the end of support for 32-bit systems by Microsoft. Origin also supports 32-bit systems. A 64-bit system is required for the new EA app, just like for Windows 11. For macOS, at least version Catalina 10.15.5 is required

To avoid any unpleasant surprises, you should check in good time whether you already have the EA app or may need to upgrade your operating system.

Casual users could get an annoying error message

According to the EA announcement, all you need to do is download the EA app and install it. After logging in with your Origin data, all your EA games should be in the library. Origin will be removed from your computer during the EA app installation

If you regularly play EA games anyway, you should have received the prompt to download the new app for some time. If, like me, you don't use Origin regularly, you may not have noticed the change. I opened Origin for this article and was confronted with an unhelpful error message:

I have restarted Origins several times and got nowhere even in offline mode. The error code "20:403" on the help page refers to the information that Origin is no longer available for Windows and that I should download the EA app. This solved the problem.

Possible problems: 32-bit systems and savegames

If you are still using a 32-bit system, you will need to upgrade your operating system to 64-bit. If you haven't already done so, you can take the opportunity to switch from Windows 10 to Windows 11. The older Windows 10 is 64-bit capable, but will no longer be supported from October this year.

To upgrade your operating system to 64-bit, you need a 64-bit-capable processor, which shouldn't usually be a problem. Unfortunately, you cannot avoid a complete reinstallation of your system with such an upgrade. This means that you will have to reinstall all your programmes - including your games in the EA app.

Saving game saves in the cloud is active by default for most games in Origin. This means that your savegames are automatically synchronised with the cloud. Your game saves are then also available in the EA app after reinstallation. However, if you have deactivated cloud storage or it is not available for certain games, you must also remember to back up your game saves for the reinstallation. You can then manually save them back to the savegame folders and continue to use them.