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Microsoft

Microsoft Office 2024 is Now Available For Macs and PCs (theverge.com) 36

Posted by msmash from the off-the-subscription-train dept.
Microsoft is releasing a new version of Office this week, designed for people that don't want to subscribe to Microsoft 365. From a report: The standalone Microsoft Office 2024 release is now available for both consumers and small businesses, and includes locked-in-time versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, and Outlook across both Mac and PC. Office 2024 includes a lot of the updates that Microsoft has been delivering to Microsoft 365 subscribers over the past few years.

Microsoft last released a standalone version of Office in 2021, and this new Office 2024 release includes improvements to the core apps, as well as accessibility and UI changes. Office 2024 has a new default theme, with Microsoft's latest Fluent Design principles that match the visual changes to Windows 11. Microsoft has also added accessibility-focused improvements to help Office users find potential accessibility issues in documents, slideshows, workbooks, and emails.

Microsoft Office 2024 is Now Available For Macs and PCs More | Reply

Microsoft Office 2024 is Now Available For Macs and PCs

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  • No Subscription == Good (Score:4, Insightful)

    by lordDallan ( 685707 ) on Wednesday October 02, 2024 @10:10AM (#64833717)
    I will buy this. I want a license and a fixed cost. Not a shitty subscription.
    • They always had a non-sub product, its just not released annually

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by fyngyrz ( 762201 )

      I will buy this. I want a license and a fixed cost. Not a shitty subscription.

      Exactly. I have the 2021 version; happy to upgrade to the 2024 version now.

      Subscription-only applications are straight up anti-consumer fishhooks. Looking directly at you, Adobe, you assholes.

    • nonsubscription that you can't use without linking a broken windows store account

  • Can I use it without a microsoft account?
    • Login requirement is why I switched to libre office. Still works fine for my needs.
      • LibreOffice is what I am currently using as well, for pretty much the same reason.
      • So you don't want the bad guys getting your docs?
      • I've been using OpenOffice, and then LibreOffice, for nearly 20 years now. The latest versions have had what I would consider 100% compatibility with Office formats for some time. They are full-featured and user friendly. I really don't know why anyone still pays for Office when LibreOffice is available. Of course, I primarily use the word processor. It's possible Office has better spreadsheets etc, but I'm not sure that's a big deal for most users.

        • The compatibility is very far from 100%, writer is better than calc but even it is far from there. Calc is missing many functions which Excel has, including some which it has had for decades, it is simply not very compatible at all.

    • If its important, did you read the article to the end?

      • And, in the end, there is the answer:

        Microsoft says Office 2024 will require a Microsoft account and an internet connection

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by fyngyrz ( 762201 )

          Microsoft says Office 2024 will require a Microsoft account and an internet connection

          So far (referenced to the non-sub version of Office21), all that's been used for is to let you know you can downgrade to the subscription version of Office any time you like to get whatever new features / fixes you absolutely must have. You can just click the offer away and carry on. I find this to be acceptable; Microsoft's not force-picking my pocket the way Adobe would.

          It's also worth pointing out that Office21's sub-

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by sconeu ( 64226 )

      In my experience, no. I've got 2019, and it still uses an MS account to confirm the license.

  • 'Nuff said.
    • That's what CoPilot is for! Instead of just Office, Clippy can annoy you throughout the entire OS. That's some vertical thinking.

  • ....underwhelmed by my apathy

  • What has actually improved? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Ormy ( 1430821 ) on Wednesday October 02, 2024 @10:35AM (#64833813)

    I remember looking forward to new MS office updates 20-25 years ago because they actually offered useful new features and genuine usability improvements. Going from Office 97 to Office 2003 was a big jump in quality, and similar from 2003 to 2007 (and less so 2010). But since then, apart from extended language support and accessibility improvements, what have they actually added that is meaningful? Cloud integration stuff? Don't care. AI copilot shit? Don't care. Maybe there are a bunch of features they've added recently that I just don't use, if so, I'd like to hear about them. Anyone?

    • much of computer-related software and hardware peaked already. I upgraded my 10-year old computer recently and I can barely tell anything changed.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Samare ( 2779329 )

        On the hardware side:
        CPUs still improve, but more in number of cores and power efficiency than in single core performance.
        GPUs are improving very fast.
        HDDs have peaked and are being replaced by SSDs.
        SATA based SSDs have peaked in speed but not in capacity but their M.2 counterpart are still improving everywhere.
        Displays are still improving a lot with OLED screens replacing LCD ones.

        On the software side:
        Windows has peaked and is actually going downhill for power users.
        macOS has peaked.
        Linux still improves a

        • "Displays are still improving a lot with OLED screens replacing LCD ones." I don't really see this as an improvement unless they somehow managed to fix the burn in issue. And I can barely tell the difference between an OLED and a high quality LCD anyway.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by necro81 ( 917438 )
      It probably doesn't have enough new features to justify an upgrade. But it's still useful as a new purchase.

      In my case, I replaced my Apple laptop six months ago. In the process, my ancient (early 2000s) copy of Office stopped working (new OS + Apple silicon = broken by deprecation). I've been getting by using Libre Office, but a genuine copy of Office would be worth $150 to me. I specifically held off getting the 2021 standalone copy, because I knew this update was coming down the pike.
    • Why dont you read the article and educate yourself vs asking the internet random questions

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Njovich ( 553857 )

      Why would they improve anything? They got 95% of companies to pay for a subscription without changing anything. This is the real annoying thing of these subscription services. They don't have to convince anyone to upgrade anymore.

    • I remember looking forward to new MS office updates 20-25 years ago because they actually offered useful new features and genuine usability improvements. Going from Office 97 to Office 2003 was a big jump in quality, and similar from 2003 to 2007 (and less so 2010).

      2010 was the last version I really liked, and its biggest improvement was the ability to use multiple Exchange mailboxes in a single profile (prior versions required separate profiles, or that secondary mailboxes were set up by IMAP).

      Since then, there's been a good amount of Onedrive integration (I hate it, but it's helpful for sending large attachments [Google does the same thing with GDrive]), the ability to open and edit PDFs in Word has gotten to a "good enough" level (not a replacement for Acrobat, but

  • Which Macs aren't PCs exactly? (Score:3)

    by BenFenner ( 981342 ) on Wednesday October 02, 2024 @11:09AM (#64833947)
    The headline implies Macs are not PCs. Macs are PCs.

  • I still have 2019 and it works great. They have not yet provided a compelling incentive to upgrade. And with a fixed license I don't have to. At least until 2019 no longer works with newer OS's.

    Subscription models are great for a company, terrible for a consumer. The opposite is true as well for fixed price versions. We were lucky in that before the advent of e-commerce, subscriptions were not frictionless for either party. The only time you'd find that kind of licensing was for very high end spe

    • I still have 2019 and it works great. They have not yet provided a compelling incentive to upgrade.

      The reason to upgrade is the most insidious: Once 2019 reaches end-of-life, it won't be able to access e-mails on Office365 accounts. Certainly, this won't affect existing users or the ability to edit Word documents or Excel sheets, but that's the big push (and I wouldn't be surprised if Onedrive integration breaks around that time, also).

  • Now Mac users can experience the hate and frustration that comes from using Word, Excel, Powerpoint, etc etc etc.

    The subscription should include a free bottle of Xanax and coupons for unlimited tequila.

  • There was a time when having an activation key for Office was sufficient to permanently activate the software. Now you must register with a Microsoft account in order to use your key.

  • The full family plan of Microsoft 365 is a DEAL! (Score:3)

    by wernst ( 536414 ) on Wednesday October 02, 2024 @12:48PM (#64834321) Homepage

    What I posted a year and a half ago AND three years ago still stands today... (copy-pasta follows)

    Potentially Unpopular Opinion: the Microsoft 365 Family Annual Subscription plan is a fantastic deal if you have a lot of family members, and devices, and could use a huge amount of online storage/backup/file syncing.

    For $100 a year, here's what your Office 365 license gets you:

    - Full use of the installable versions of Word, PowerPoint, Excel, Outlook, Publisher, and Access, plus OneNote (although OneNote is now free for anyone to use, it integrates with the rest of Office 365).
    - These installations work on ALL your devices: Windows PCs, Macintoshes, Android devices (phone/tablets/ChromeOS), iPhones, iPads. So in my case, I have Office installed on my Windows desktop, my laptop, my *other* desktop, my MacBook, my Android phone, my Android tablet, and my Chromebook. All for one license.
    - One TB (!) of online storage (or backup) on Microsoft OneDrive for your documents, music, photos, or whatever, using a Dropbox-like syncing tool that works across devices if you like, so I can access all my files and photos across all my devices all the time from anywhere, or just use it as an off-site backup. Acronis charges about this much for 1TB of online storage just by itself. Carbonite is like $80 a year. iDrive is like $70 a year. If you were going to use an online backup tool for lots of stuff, then you might as well do Office 365 - it's like paying for the online storage you were looking for, and getting all the Office applications for free.
    - Full access to the online versions of MS Office. So if I'm at someone else's PC or at a business center in a hotel, or using the PWA version on my Chromebook, or need to do some office work on my Linux box, I can open up (a semi-reduced feature version of) Word or Excel in a web browser, and if I'm using OneDrive (and I am), I can access all my files from that browser too.
    - And then I can have 5 family members do all this too, all on the same license, because that $100 a year is for the whole family! So my wife each gets all these apps on all her devices, and she gets 1TB of device-syncing OneDrive storage too. So does my kid. So does my Mom. So does my Father in Law. So each person is getting all this stuff, including 1TB of online storage EACH, for about $20 a year.

    Now don't get me wrong, I've used and recommended LibreOffice for years too, and I fully respect its capabilities, but Microsoft's pricing model for Office reminds me of Netflix vs. Torrents for movies: yes, Torrents are free, but Netflix is so much quality content for so little money, if you can swing a few bucks a month, it's worth it. So is Office 365.

    Yes, yes, Hail Corporate.

    (Ninja 2024 edit: now you also get a lot of extra online content and apps for your license too. Other than product names, everything I wrote 3 years ago still applies. If you have 6 friends who need Office and a TB of online storage, each of you chip in $18 a year and stop worrying about licenses.)

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