Having gone through iWork at uni and later MS Office at work, O365 is definitely worth it. However, Office for Mac is simply terrible. No shortcuts, fraction of productivity; easier to launch Parallels and use Mac. Also, switching from Dropbox now to M365 and seeing that your M365 licence will eventually be the Windows 11 subscription model, it's definitely worth it.
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OFFICE 365 -- Worth it?
- Thread starter Mork
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The other thing about MS Office for Mac that never gets mentioned is that there are two menus visible for each Office app. They're not duplicates... some functions are in one menu, others in the other menu, with no rhyme or reason why they're split between the two menus.
Because regardless of what I like to have on my desk, the world (ie business world) runs on Microsoft and it’s works the best. When I use alternates to Excel for example, or even Excel for Mac, I usually end up a frustrated mess.
I absolutely hate the subscription model. I use prior versions of Office, before the subscription nonsense. I'd rather pay for something once, use it until it nolonger does what I need than keep paying for something over and over. The best part is I can use it on a non-Internet connected machine. I keep my important stuff off any networked machine.
MS will have to pry Office 2019 from my cold, dead hands.
MS will have to pry Office 2019 from my cold, dead hands.
Microsoft still offers a buy once office package, its just that they don’t really advertise it. That’s supposed to be the case with the next version too. I always upgrade to a new version of office when it comes out, but I never buy the subscription model.
Microsoft sells Office 2019 for $250 (student version is $150). Office 365 Family is $100, can be used on your Mac, PC, iPad, iPhone (up to 5 different devices at the same time), does not require any upgrades and can be shared with 5 others - each of which gets 1TB of OneDrive storage.
It just doesn't seem like the standalone version is a very good deal anymore - especially if you always upgrade. I had been using my old Office 2011 up until two years ago, but it started crashing too often. I dislike subscription software, but this just seemed like a no-brainer and a surprisingly good deal for Microsoft.
Now, I suppose I could make do with the iWork apps, LibreOffice, etc. since I'm retired now. But for $8/month I didn't see any reason not to stick with Office. I use LibreOffice to access my very old AppleWorks/ClarisWorks files though, I don't think there's any other way to do that. It's great that open source software like LibreOffice is available, but it feels really slow and generally awkward to me.
It just doesn't seem like the standalone version is a very good deal anymore - especially if you always upgrade. I had been using my old Office 2011 up until two years ago, but it started crashing too often. I dislike subscription software, but this just seemed like a no-brainer and a surprisingly good deal for Microsoft.
Now, I suppose I could make do with the iWork apps, LibreOffice, etc. since I'm retired now. But for $8/month I didn't see any reason not to stick with Office. I use LibreOffice to access my very old AppleWorks/ClarisWorks files though, I don't think there's any other way to do that. It's great that open source software like LibreOffice is available, but it feels really slow and generally awkward to me.
I was an intermediate MS Office user. I can understand why some users say they need compatibility with their work environment. In truth if they are not to adapt it a pdf file rocks.
Some users need MS Excel. Eg data scientists working with some MS cloud environment benefit from the ease of integration. Most functions of Excel non data scientists are copied in LibreOffice. LibreOffice is pretty good at converting. It is free.
iWorks serves most casual non business users. I myself happily use it. It's thought through.
I helped some users ditch MS Office in favor of LibreOffice. They were low on cash and Libre rips MS pretty well off. Libre's tablet versions are horrible for now.
Some users need MS Excel. Eg data scientists working with some MS cloud environment benefit from the ease of integration. Most functions of Excel non data scientists are copied in LibreOffice. LibreOffice is pretty good at converting. It is free.
iWorks serves most casual non business users. I myself happily use it. It's thought through.
I helped some users ditch MS Office in favor of LibreOffice. They were low on cash and Libre rips MS pretty well off. Libre's tablet versions are horrible for now.
If you’re using it on multiple devices, o365 is definitely worth looking at. For just one computer, you can often find office standalone for a lot less than msrp. I bought my copy of office 2019 mac for $75.
I’m prepaid until 2027 I think. Here in South Africa it’s pretty easy to find a 12 month prepaid voucher for R200-300 ($11-$17) on Gumtree or FB Marketplace. Every so often I’ll grab an extra one or two, for myself or family.
They’re included with many laptop deals, and a ton of folks flog them online rather than use it.
They’re included with many laptop deals, and a ton of folks flog them online rather than use it.
Yeah, I've been trying to get out from under this specific subscription given the price, but I use it on multiple computers and for some of those, the OneDrive cloud storage is just too good to pass up, at least storage wise. The app, is horrible but it does what I need it to do