Mindstorms robotics sets from Lego have been on the market since 1998. They appeared as a result of a collaboration between Lego and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

Now, according to Brick Fanatics fan site and Brickset, Lego has announced that it will discontinue Mindstorms at the end of the year, but will provide supporting the mobile application for at least two more years after that.

“However, now having a number of priorities in LEGO Education and other Build & Code experiences, we have decided to focus our resources and future plans by redirecting our Mindstorms Robot Inventor team and their expertise into different areas of the business”, the company said in a statement published on the Brick Fanatics website. “This means the physical Mindstorms Robot Inventor product (51515) and its related elements (88016 and 88018) are to exit our portfolio from the end of 2022, whilst digital platforms – such as the LEGO Mindstorms Robot Inventor App – will remain live until at least the end of 2024.”

Starting with the Lego Mindstorms Robotics Invention System over 24 years ago, the sets used advanced Lego Technics parts with gears and other robotics parts running on a basic Brick processor unit. They took a big step forward in 2006 with the introduction of the next generation of Mindstorms sets, called NXT.

Another big leap came in 2013 with the EV3 robotics platform. This new line was compatible with the NXT series, offering improvements in sensor load and processing power. Lego has also launched dedicated mobile apps, turning iOS and Android devices into remote controls for Mindstorms projects. Finally, they created the Mindstorms community, where users can share their creations with other developers.

The last official product was the Robot Inventor line from 2020, but nothing new has appeared since then, Lego has focused on other projects.