Microsoft’s Office suite for iPad, iPhone, and Android is now free. In a surprise move, the software giant is shaking up its mobile Office strategy to keep consumers hooked to Word, Excel, and PowerPoint documents. Starting today, you’ll no longer need an Office 365 subscription to edit documents or store them in the cloud. The move comes just days after Microsoft announced a strategic partnership with Dropbox to integrate the cloud storage service into Office across desktop, mobile, and the web. You can now download Office for iPad and store all your documents on Dropbox without paying Microsoft anything at all. Microsoft is also releasing a brand new iPhone app today, alongside a preview of Office for Android tablets, all with Dropbox integration.
The news I’ve been waiting for. The fact that it’s going to be free is very nice, but the Android tablet version specifically has me very excited. Office is the number one tool with which I earn my living, and having the proper Office on my Xperia Z2 Tablet is a godsend.
The past decade of sweeping changes in the computing industry is finally truly taking hold inside Microsoft.
If they are making Office free, then how are they going to make money?
Banner ads?
Cloud storage (Office 365) accounts, Windows and Office licenses for people who want to use it on desktop Windows or OS X, etc. still cost money. This is no different than them trying to push ActiveX by bundling IE with Windows.
No, its different. Companies, Microsoft’s current hardware OEMS, are selling Android laptops and chromebooks. Those can now use MS office, without paying MS a dime.
IE was never a huge revenue source for MS. It was always a strategy to prevent people from writing web apps that worked on anything other than MS windows.
I’m not sure what there thinking is with this.
The want to avoid that Google Drive (or other Android/iOS office suites) eats MSOffice’s market share.
The reason I’m asking is because if Microsoft generally begin to give away their software, then they truly need a new way to make money.
Of course if the entire thing is only meant to be a supplementary software for the desktop product, then it makes fully sense to just give it away.
Or it could be part of a larger change. I’m still trying to figure out exactly where the new Microsoft CEO will take them.
This is like comparing apples and oranges. Besides, I don’t think they bundled IE with Windows to push ActiveX.
Microsoft has dozens of different ways to make money, many of which could conceivably be bolstered by Office everywhere.
I’m not sure about the Android version, but on the new iPad version you still need an O365 subscription for more advanced functionality.
That, and Office for Desktop is still a huge thing with a billion users.
LOL, at some point people in Redmon started to believe their own koolaid and lost all contact with reality.
The $26 billion in revenue that Office brought in the last fiscal quarter must be the koolaid too, right?
You’re always on cue with your nonsense.
Nelson, put down the astroturf hat for a sec, let your brain breathe for a few precious moments so you can exercise basic common sense, and just realize how silly the claim, that the number of desktop Office users amount to 1/7th of the world’s population, really is.
What’s a more realistic figure? You’re so keen on keeping me grounded in reality, but have yet to provide a good reason why Microsoft’s number is wrong besides what amounts to “that can’t be it”.
Office is huge, your incredulity aside.
You seem confused, Microsoft is the party making the ridiculous statement, the burden of proof is with them not me.
Anyhow. All that is needed to not take, at face value, the claim that 1/7th of the human population are desktop Office users is a minimal level of contact with, and comprehension of, the realities of the world in which one lives.
Again, you don’t really present much except “that can’t possibly be it”, and I don’t really think that is compelling enough to even call into question Microsoft’s claim.
It’d be one thing if they claimed to have a 1B install base but didn’t have the sky high revenues to match the claim, but that’s not the case and every single Office related venture within Microsoft is growing like a weed.
Exchange/Lync/SharePoint post triple digit growth on what seems like every quarter at this point, Office 365 is at 7 million consumer installs, etc.
If you couple this with the 1.5B install base for Windows (of which Win7 sold 750M licenses, Win8 has sold north of 300M roughly) then it doesn’t look all that unrealistic.
To each his own though, you don’t have to believe Microsoft. It is however far from self evident that what they’re saying is untrue, especially not to the extent to warrant your “reality” remarks.
Nelson, the fact that you can’t provide a single verified statistic directly related to the claim at hand should have been a hint about it being not very reliable.
Instead you keep bringing tangential pro-MS talking points, and somehow insisting that the burden of proof on that ridiculous claim is on me. As if not taking at face value a claim by a Microsoft marketoid, high on their own supply, is somehow a thought crime or something.
Again, if you can’t grasp the ridiculousness of the implication that 1/7th of the world’s population are desktop users of Office. Then you could very well be proving my point regarding kool aid consumption leading to a divorce from reality.
PS. Since reading and comprehension may not be not your thing, know that I’m not denying Office’s popularity or that it is a cash cow for Microsoft. I was simply poking fun at the silliness of that specific claim.
Cheers.
Edited 2014-11-07 18:42 UTC
Nelson, on a side note, do you have an article for Nokia?
An article for them on what? I have a few good reads.
With people being so desperate for Office functionality then they should be helping to sell a lot of those Microsoft Phone thingies. It isn’t. I think we can safely say that a billion people are using mobile phones though.
You do amusingly exemplify Microsoft’s own inflated opinion of it’s own place in the world Nelson. That’s their irreversible problem.
I think you conflate Office’s desktop dominance with it being a primary motivator in the purchase decision of a cell phone.
That’s stupid, and a mischaracterization of my position. Obviously it augments the experience (For example, getting a work email and being able to open the PPT in full fidelity is a huge win), but its by no means the reason people are or are not buying Windows Phones.
That was exactly how Microsoft thought things would happen and they are still lumbered by that mindset. People use Windows at work, people would automatically use Windows on their phone, people use Office and Exchange at work, people would want to connect to Exchange and use Office on their phones. It should have been a slam dunk. They got rather upset when that logic just didn’t follow.
On the contrary, it is entirely accurate and has been the only ‘strategy’, such that they have one, that Microsoft have had since they started with mobile computing.
If nothing else you do, quite inadvertently and unintentionally at times, give an insight into Microsoft’s psyche.
The same is true for Android, it’s not ‘free’, you need an Office 365 subscription.
> The reason I’m asking is because if Microsoft generally begin to give away their software, then they truly need a new way to make money.
For starters, this stuff isn’t free for business use. They also haven’t changed their pricing on Windows Server or Azure, both of which are huge moneymakers for them right now.
It’s the tip of the iceberg.
MS is heading into the cloud.
there is their Office 365 service, as well as Azure.
Hell, didn’t they recently drop the OEM price for Windows 8 to zero for devices with a 8″ or smaller screen?
Yes they did. Where Google eats the cost of ChromeOS to bolster Chrome, Microsoft does it with Bing.
And Office 365 is a relatively successful example of taking an old business and moving it onto a new business model. Its interesting because many (myself included) had doubts about whether people would even pay for a subscription based productivity suite.
Also, I’m not sure that this implies that Office for Windows or Mac are going to be free. I’ve actually kept away from Office for iOS because I don’t find the tablet formfactor to be good for productivity apps. Adding a keyboard would help, but overall, I prefer to do this kind of thing on a “real” computer. Microsoft is surely aware of this, so both the environment and the cost will impede adoption. By making it free, people will download and use it even if they don’t really like it, and this will maintain the addition to Office, leading to stronger sales of the desktop versions. Basically, it’s a smart marking move that will actually increase revenue.
Also, it will keep the execs etc using MS Office rather than switch to Google or Apple alternatives on their tablets.
That Apple made sure to include a touch friendly office suite with the intro of iPad was ingenious.
The execs may not do much long form writing, but they bring all kinds of documents and spreadsheets between meetings. And i keep seeing tablets showing up on meeting room tables for that very reason.
It allows MS to keep doing the pr seat, or whatever, licensing for their server products for larger corporations.
And for smaller businesses they can offer cloud services that “enables” said businesses to not worry about server maintenance and backup routines. Just pay the monthly bill and connect whatever devices you have.
I find it hilarious that my Galaxy Note Pro 12.2″ isn’t ‘supported’ to install it onto, neither is my Galaxy Note 3. Yet the low end phone that I purchased for my mother can have it installed onto, and it’s somewhere between an S3 and S4.
So it’s the number one tool with which you earn a living, but you weren’t willing to pay for it?
I also have to wonder if this is going to be free or infected with adware. It’s about time for the tech media to start properly recognizing and clarifying the difference.
Edited 2014-11-06 15:16 UTC
It’s not available yet. I cannot pay for it at all.
Time to start running Android on a PC
What is the best solution to do so?
What do you mean by ‘PC’ ?
I don’t think there are Android x86 images that can be installed on every day standard x86 PCs, due to the driver situation. There are some small notebooks that come with android. That would probably be your best bet.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2357501/hp-brings-android-to-laptops…
The good news is the last bits of the Android Linux Kernel were just added to the staging-next branch. So they’ll eventually make it into Linus’ kernel. That should mean it will be easier to have something of an Android Linux Distro. I think there would still need to be some kind of a shim to get the Android Graphics driver system to use traditional Linux Kernel drivers. There is a system to allow wayland and mir to use Android Drivers. But the other way around.
http://android-x86.org/
ChromeOS?
Coincidentally, I also have an Xperia Z2 tablet. I recently took a short trip where I decided to take it and NOT my usual laptop. I have a desktop stand (with the magnetic charger, even), a Bluetooth keyboard, and a Bluetooth mouse. All I was going to be doing was checking Facebook and email and maybe some Plants vs Zombies. What I found was that the tablet was terrible. The keyboard and mouse weren’t just second-class citizens, they barely worked. PvZ was unplayable with a mouse; it would fail to move for a few seconds at time, fail to click, sometimes DELAY click, which in combination with failing to click caused me to mis-double click, etc. Web-surfing drove me nuts. I use the scroll wheel, and it behave erratically at best when trying to scroll down, say, the main page of Ars Technica looking at headlines. I can’t imagine trying to rely on it for work in Office.
Could be bluetooth related.
Either an overly aggressive power saving profile, or low battery on the devices (as crazy as it sounds).
Free? The price is still too high. They would have to PAY ME to use ANYTHING from Misrosoft. I remember well the day, about 5 years ago, when I finally broke my last M$ Winblows install disc (that came with the computer I bought,) and dropped it into the trash, after becoming confident I’d never need it again, from running nothing but GNU/Linux for years. (Fedora first, then LinuxMint!)
Why would I ever let those greedy bastards in Redmond WORM their way back into my computing environment?
Their entire business model, like their software, is obsolete. It depends on NOT having viable competition, which thanks to RMS, LT, and the vast cadre of mostly unsung heroes who took their work and made an entire userland out of it, as well as providing backbone for the interwebs, and of course to no small extent Apple, Misrosoft is NOT the only option anymore, and you notice a lot of people have fled their once seemingly-unshakeable monopoly, as soon as their WAS somewhere to flee to!
I use LibreOffice, and Pages (when I’m using my Mac, or iOS devices,) and Misrosoft can KEEP their wretchware, even at “FREE,” it costs way too much.
You might think this stance childish, but I am not in the habit of rewarding monopolistic, anti-competitive behavior and making the already filthy, stinking rich even filthy-stinking-richer. At least when you sacrifice openness by buying Apple’s products, you get an ACTUAL PRODUCT, and you’ve gotta admit, they’re pretty sweet and slick. How many laptops can claim 11+ hour battery life that weren’t made by Apple? Other computers simply aren’t as well designed and engineered. Apple’s MacBook Air is the first laptop I’ve seen that actually has a solution to the thermal problems that plague most other laptops. They require underside ventilation, and usually blow hot air out the left or right sides. The Air directs that heat up the screen from the middle, is whisper quiet most of the time, and you can actually USE on your lap. It’s super-light, fast, has a great keyboard…
Misrosoft never could, nor would make something like that. It goes against their business model. They’ve been trying with the “Surface,” but smart people already know better by now than to use anything from Misrosoft; they tried to give some to a TV news show to get them in front of the public, (I think it was CNN,) and you know what they used them for? Stands for their iPADS! Oprah it seems also shilled for them, “tweeting” about how great the “Surface” is… FROM HER iPAD!!! Notice how people who know don’t use the “Surface”? And if they’re smart, the don’t use “Office” either. Do people not remember how many viruses spread using M$ Word documents? People have really short memories, I guess.
I take issue with some things Apple has done historically, I’m no “drooling fanboy,” but they do put their customer’s happiness first, by and large, even if they do sometimes seem to presume to know best what will make them happy… their becoming the most valuable company on Earth kind of underscores the point that they do take care of their customers and do it pretty damned well.
(By contrast, Misrosoft once managed to be a pretty-highly valued company, at least monetarily, but they did it by cheating their customers, cheating the government, committing fraud, racketeering, and probably a host of other sneaky, underhanded tricks that many people have forgotten about. (They’ve been convicted of violating antitrust laws repeatedly, but never meaningfully punished.) If the rich were REALLY subject to the same laws as we are, and if when a corporation breaks the law, they put the FLESH AND BLOOD HUMANS RESPONSIBLE IN JAIL, like they should, the entire corporate hierarchy of Misrosoft would still be in jail right now. Sadly, the US government, that once broke up Standard Oil and Ma Bell, couldn’t stand up to a scrawny, pencil-necked geek. How the mighty have fallen.)
(While I’m rambling, I’ll mention a story I recently saw making the rounds that there’s a kind of malware that attacks OS-X and iOS devices running rampant in China. The story was clickbait, of course, and barely mentions that it comes from some third-party app store. Well gosh… if you defeat the security features of your own computer and install software from some random bunch of guys you don’t know… you have to kind of expect that. The strength of OS-X against malware doesn’t help you if YOU TURN THE SECURITY OFF! A bit like sending all the police in a town home at night, and then being surprised at the resulting nocturnal crime-spree. Leave the security settings on “ON” and you really haven’t much to worry about. Unlike if you run Misrosoft “software,” where exposing you to malware is part of their business-model. Can I prove this? Well, anecdotally, sure. Consider this: what would happen to Misrosoft if they EVER produced a rock-solid, secure, useable OS that DIDN’T need constantly to be updated? They’d sell a BUNCH of them, and then once everyone had it, they’d never sell another copy again. Think about it.)
When a for-profit company’s only profit-generating product is software, as Misrosoft’s is, they CAN’T give something away for free, unless it somehow makes them even MORE money. Like a drug-dealer. Careful folks… only the first hit’s free. Once they draw you in, and get you to keep using their proprietary document format, meaning to read the documents you create perfectly, you may need to have “Office” installed on your home machine, and of course it will have to be the most recent version… then they’ve GOT you. LibreOffice does a pretty good job reading their crappy file format, but it isn’t reliably as good at it as the software made by the jerks who made the format in the first place. Their bottom line is protected by keeping you beholden to them.
Free yourselves by REFUSING to use their “FREE” software. REMEMBER: It’s not really free, it’s a trap.
WOW! Paranoid much?
NSA, please. “You’re just paranoid” hasn’t been a valid argument since Snowden, if it ever was.
Oh dear! There’s always one!
Lmao. You strike me as the type of person to bitch about an init system too, right?
Edited 2014-11-06 16:37 UTC
Well written. Could you please send this to my boss in Word-format? He doesn’t like reading from an internetpage. /s
We get it. You like using free software on expensive hardware. But this is free software that you can use on that expensive hardware without any strings attached. If you want to save your files as PDF and email them with gmail…you can.
However, a LOT of people pretty much prefer that obsolete piece of junk that hardly costs anything and has been the standard Office tool for the last 15 years for a billion users
David and Thom!!!
I am very happy to see a lot of OS news stuff right here. Thanks a lot, and continue at this peace!
Would anyone care to guess what level of penetration MS have calculated they will need before they “Improve our licencing model for your convenience” by charging for the latest, so much better but non backward compatible Android/IoS etc versions??
MS have finally woken up to a way to make loads of dosh down the road, just need to hook a few million suckers with a ‘free’ version first. They understand the BYOD potential and they see that the Surface has sunk without trace. This is a MUCH better way of creating locked in future revenue stream. Go Microsoft!!!
Sent from my Dell Laptop running Linux – OMG I’m doomed
Goodness, anyone who thinks Office will still be free once it establishes its marketshare on these new platforms needs to read about the history of the company behind it and their marketing tactics.
Okay, I will bite. Please tell me about a product that they used to give away but now charge for. I can give dozens of examples that used to be paid but are now actually free
The free version of Office 365 is only really useful as an Office viewer for those who don’t or can’t install Office on their systems. As far as editing new documents on the free version of Office 365, it’s extremely limited. No merging of table cells, extremely limited table formatting options. And the collaborative editing doesn’t work as well as Google Docs.
You have to have a subscription to Office 365, so how is this free?
They should just port LibreOffice to Android and be done with it.
You didn’t read at all, did you? From the original article: “Starting today, you’ll no longer need an Office 365 subscription to edit documents or store them in the cloud.”
and “You can now download Office for iPad and store all your documents on Dropbox without paying Microsoft anything at all.”
LibreOffice port is available on the market by at least two developers, check it out.