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Microsoft Releases Office 2016 for Mac With Updated Versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and More
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whoa . . . . that's crazy
I should be able to upgrade to this soon at work. Office 2011 has really gone downhill on my iMac. Especially apps like Outlook and Lync that I have to use every day to communicate. Outlook has gotten to the point where I can't even see shared calendars most of the time. It also likes to randomly stop fetching mail and disconnect from the network without me knowing. Usually restarting the app kicks it into gear as the "Send/Receive" button doesn't often work. I have similar issues with Lync, but Lync has always been a buggy POS, even going back to the Communicator days. Mine loves to randomly disconnect without warning, so I end up with people running down to my office to talk about stuff because I'm not online. One other guy on my team has a Mac and he has the same issues. I'm not really sure who to blame here. I'm inclined to blame Microsoft because the crappy Lync software has been permanently broken. But Apple probably hasn't helped matters much with all their networking issues lately and the fact that I still have bugs logging in over the network sometimes when my iMac wakes up from sleep. It just refuses to do anything and I have to reboot. Although, to be fair, it is logging into a Windows managed network. So who knows. I just don't understand why it's 2015 and we still have super buggy software. They've had decades to perfect things like network connectivity and yet everything still sucks.
So far, for both Windows and Mac, the only difference is updating major versions. O365 subscriptions get all updates for the life of their subscriptions, regardless of major versions. Standalone will only get updates for the life of the major version you bought. So if you buy through O365, and Office 2017 for Mac gets released, you'd get it for free, but someone who bought Office 2016 wouldn't.
Software is identical, version for version.
The authentication for "it's OK to use" is the difference.
Any idea when? I have been running the beta and and update notification just came up telling me that updates to versions 15.11.2 are available. These versions aren't the 365 version just released right?
My experience was different - I've been running the previews for a while. Checking for updates today prompted me to download the latest (production release) update. There was no need to access my Office 365 account page at all - I just checked for updates.
I actually like the subscription model. We always get the latest software and $7 a month comes with 1TB of cloud storage per user... pretty sweet deal if you ask me.
Eventually you'll realize nobody 'owns' software, you purchase a license to use software. Whether you pay, 150 upfront, or 7 dollars a month, its the same deal.
Still running Word 2008 here because it has Find/Replace in **all open documents** which I can't live without. I asked Microsoft to please bring that function back. But will they listen?
I'm not a huge fan of software subscription mostly because they're all terrible values (I'm looking at you Adobe), but Office 365 is a damn good deal. The 1TB of OneDrive storage alone makes is a good deal (cheaper than Dropbox and WAY cheaper then Apple if you buy in 1 year increments), Office is just icing on the cake.
Thanks. So it depends on when Microsoft will be releasing the next major version, which variant is cheaper.
The big difference is the subscription version you get to pay $79-99 every year. The boxed version you pay $130 once. So, given the upgrade cycles of Office Mac the past decade, the subscription version allow you to donate anywhere from $50 to $350 extra to Nadella's pension fund. Oh, but you will get the iOS app too if you subscribe, so that is another bonus. /sarc
Last version came out in 2010. Version before that came out in 2008. Version before that 2004. So no clear cycle but at least two years, and as many as 5. MS's Mac division is small and getting smaller so I wouldn't expect a quick turnaround here.
I agree it's the worst but I would hardly say it didn't get any traction. It's still sadly heavily used in enterprise. It's been like that for quite a long time.
It's funny though, the preview version of 2016 has been much more stable than 2011, even though it had its bugs. Can't wait for a standalone version in September!