How-To Geek
A Free Microsoft Office: Is Office Online Worth Using?
Microsoft’s Office Online is a completely free, web-based version of Microsoft Office. This online office suite is clearly competing with Google Docs, but it’s also a potential replacement for the desktop version of Office.
We’ll compare Office Online to both the desktop version of Microsoft Office and Google Docs to see where it fits. Should you use Office Online instead of Office 2013 or Google Docs?
Office Online vs. Desktop Office
Unlike all of Microsoft’s other Office products, Office Online at office.com is completely free. This is Office Online’s biggest advantage over desktop versions of Microsoft Office. You can use it on all the PCs you want without paying for additional boxed copies or subscribing to Office 365, Microsoft’s subscription service for Office.
Becausee it’s a web application that runs in your browser, Office Online will run on everything, from Linux PCs and Chromebooks to iPads and Android tablets. It doesn’t require any special plug-in and works in any popular browser, including Firefox, Chrome, and Safari — not just Internet Explorer.
Office Online saves your documents to your Microsoft OneDrive (formerly known as SkyDrive) storage online. You can use the OneDrive integration in Windows 8.1 or the OneDrive desktop application on previous versions of Windows to sync the documents you create to your computer, getting local copies in Microsoft Office format. Office 2013 saves your documents to OneDrive by default, so Office Online works well as a companion web application. Your documents may already be available in OneDrive.
The web-based version of Office also offers better collaboration features than the desktop-based version of Office does. For example, when you collaborate with other people in the desktop version of Word 2013, only one person can edit the same paragraph at a time. Word Online offers real-time editing that allows multiple people to edit the same paragraph at a time.
Office Online is more limited than Microsoft Office. Microsoft provides Word Online, Excel Online, PowerPoint Online, and OneNote Online. If you depend on other applications, like Microsoft Access, you’re out of luck.
These online applications are also simplified and stripped down. While they offer a similar interface to the desktop version of Office, complete with a ribbon, they have fewer features built in. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, as most people don’t use all of the features available in the desktop Office apps. Want to do a mail merge or run macros? You can’t do that in Office Online, but you probably don’t need those features anyway.
Office Online also won’t work when you don’t have an Internet connection. If you want to edit documents offline, you’ll need the desktop version of Office.
Pros: Office Online is completely free, can easily be accessed from any device, and is better for real-time collaboration.
Cons: Office Online only provides a few popular Office applications, doesn’t have many of the more advanced features, and only works when you have an Internet connection.
Office Online vs. Google Docs
Google Docs is Google’s free, web-based office suite. Office Online is Microsoft’s response to the rise of Google Docs.
Office Online and Google Docs are fairly similar at this point. Both are free, web-based applications you run in your browser. Both are simplified, stripped-down experiences that save your files to an online storage service — Microsoft OneDrive or Google Drive. Both have built-in real-time collaboration features. Both offer applications for creating documents, spreadsheets, and presentations. Google Docs also offers applications for creating forms and drawings, but Office Online offers a full-featured note-taking app in OneNote. Each has a few different features the other doesn’t have, but they’re very similar for average users.
Love it or hate it, Microsoft Office is still basically the standard when it comes to office suites. Office Online feels much more like Microsoft Office than Google Docs does — right down to the ribbon. More importantly, Office Online saves your documents in Microsoft Office file formats like .docx, .xlsx, and .pptx. Office Online should have better compatibility with Microsoft Office files. When you create a file in Office Online, it should look the same in the desktop version of Microsoft Office. Microsoft knows their own file formats, while Google Docs isn’t perfect at dealing with them.
Google Docs works offline, but Office Online always requires an Internet connection. Despite Microsoft’s Scroogled advertisements, Google Docs has offline support while Office Online doesn’t. Google Docs is compelling if you want to use a free office suite offline as well as online — Microsoft would like you to pay for the desktop version if you’d like to occasionally use it offline.
Pros: Office Online offers native compatibility with Office document formats. It also has a more familiar interface if you’re used to modern, ribbonized versions of Office.
Cons: You can’t edit documents offline with Office Online.
So, should you use Office Online? Well, that’s up to you. If you’d like a completely free version of Office so you don’t have to pay Microsoft $9.99 a month, it’s a compelling option. On the other hand, you may need the more advanced features in the desktop version of Office. If you’re already using Google Docs, you may want to switch for the better office document compatibility — or you may want to start with Google Docs for the offline support. It’s up to you.
You should give the different applications here a spin and see which one is best for you. Some people need many of the advanced features in Office, while some people just need the basics.
Great tools for casual use, but docs and spreadsheets that contain confidential info, I would not want to store them unencrypted anywhere in the cloud - and that would include both GDrive and OneDrive. Sure, both require you to log in with ID and password, and you can set up two-factor authentication for added security, but your data is still stored unencrypted and vulnerable to being read if the provider server(s) get hacked.
One of my spreadsheets - encrypted and protected by a strong password - is a master list of all my online ID's, passwords, and other sensitive info. Would never store / edit that (and others) with Google or MS office online...
as far as i can see, only ie allows ctrl+V (paste)
So I cannot save my document to my computer? And can only access my document when I am connected to the internet? Thanks but no thanks... Microsoft Office should be FREE! Too many students rely on that program to produce term papers and dissertations. Student's don't have a whole lot of money to throw around. Students who need to use other languages in their produced text need the flexibility of an office suite that is built into the computer for saving onto the computer. To say nothing of the potential for hackers to gain access to your document and alter that document--oh, that would never happen! Colour me not convinced and not sold.
Steven,
You can save the files to your desktop from Office Online. You go to file>save as>download to download a copy of the document to your computer. Otherwise the document is automatically saved online just like Google Drive. I mostly use Google Drive and I am also able to save the documents to my computer in Office or Google format. Nowadays if I really need to use an office suite on my computer I use Libre Office. It does the job but like I said I mostly use Google Drive now.
So you're saying OneDrive supports ctrl-V in only IE?
Open Office has been around for a long time, and it is a perfectly viable alternative. I got my Bachelor degree with it, so it will certainly work for anyone I can think of.
As to making it free... Office student edition is not expensive. Schools can get HUGE discounts on MS products, since MS wants a captive audience. Considering how many college kids are carrying laptops these days (often even expensive MacBooks), an extra $100 or so should not be a huge additional burden. That is the cost of one book for some of the more esoteric classes.
I agree with Open Office. I prefer Libre Office but in the end it is pretty much the same. In recent years I've moved myself away from Microsoft Office solely depending mostly on Google Drive and Libre Office if I really need to. Otherwise I like to keep everything in my Google Drive.
I don't trust MS enough these days to use any of their online services. It wouldn't surprise me at all to find a clause in the agreement saying 'We own your data on our servers.' Ever since the whole NSA scandal went down I'm getting off of all the 'free' online services, because IMO, you don't really own that account, data or hard drive space. I'm working on setting up my own private email server as well on Linux CentOS 6.5 (learning as I go.) The older I get, the less I trust governments, large corporations... and the word 'free.'
@ChrisHoffman What if you open a document that was created in the desktop version of Office and it contains features not in Office Online? Do you know if it can handle that? Also, will documents created with Office 2010 open in Office Online?
Sometimes. Some features are supported, even if there's no UI to create that feature in the online version. With other features, you're pretty much hosed.
Yes. I needed to work on a spreadsheet with coworkers in real time, so I created it in Excel 2010, then uploaded and edited in Office Online. Worked great. Except for those unsupported features.
If openoffice or libreoffice don't cut it for you, also consider Corel software. Wordperfect is still well featured, as well as the Excel/Powerpoint equivalents. Format compatibility is very good, and the home & student version is pretty cheap.
By the way, the new name is skydrive, not onedrive
Online office is ok for those who like Brand "W" and easy access to documents that I would say are "no security necessary" for online storage. But as others have pointed out, documents you deem as security issues, there's always offline storage. But ... When using an online software, how can you be sure that what you create and save to your "secure" storage, is not duplicated on "their" software/hardware? I'm sorry, but online solutions, for me anyway, I will never consider as safe by any stretch of the imagination unless I'm accessing a server I control. And, as others have also pointed out, there are other alternatives to Brand "W" with no compatibility issues (read "with Windows"), and, they're FREE!
No, it's Onedrive.
In the UK 'Sky' is a large TV corporate with relevant trademark protection.
Might as well call it, say, ESPNDrive.
Word on line for editing, on android, works NICELY only within the dolphin browser. it doesn't in chrome, native browser, firefox, opera, boatbrowser. congrats to the dolphin team : it's fast & workable ! ofcourse, paste & copy don't work...
Open Office and Libre Office certainly are usable but they really have their shortcomings. Writer, for example, doesn't format well. As much as I've grown to dislike it the official Word is really the professional standard. And how expensive the books and tuition is is all the more reason that $100 is quite a bit, especially for students like me who have a very tight budget in lieu of a thousand+ dollar Macbook. However, many schools including mine do offer student subscriptions for software including Office 365 and Office 07 for older systems/offline installs. Still, I won't use Office Online out of principle that they are only doing this so they don't lose more people to Google's service. I will continue using Visual Studio Pro extensively though.