OT: Microsoft Office: subscribe or one-time purchase?

[Climb01742]

My gigs are freelance and mostly, I work from home. I have Office 2011, but the lovely folks in Redmond have stopped updating it. Office is the defacto standard for businesses I work with (but Google is gaining, interestingly).

So...do I update to the new version of Office by subscription or do I do a one-time purchase? Philosophically, giving Redmond an ongoing revenue stream bugs me, but continual updates and cloud storage are pluses with the subscription. Staying current with Office is, sadly, still just a fact of life among 90% of the firms I deal with.

Anyone faced the same choice? Any thoughts or suggestions appreciated. Thanks!

[Ozz]

went thru this a couple years ago when family got new computers....I too found it annoying.

But IIRC, we are paying about $12 per month for 2-3 computers that will be updated every 3 years or so....

So, $300 to $450 over 3 years vs buying Office at $120 for each computer and then again when we replaced them.

Total cost seemed close enough that it was not worth getting too worked up about.

And yeah, it is about MSFT getting a more consistent revenue stream....especially from folks who don't upgrade computers every couple years.

[Black Dog]

went thru this a couple years ago when family got new computers....I too found it annoying.

But IIRC, we are paying about $12 per month for 2-3 computers that will be updated every 3 years or so....

So, $300 to $450 over 3 years vs buying Office at $120 for each computer and then again when we replaced them.

Total cost seemed close enough that it was not worth getting too worked up about.

And yeah, it is about MSFT getting a more consistent revenue stream....especially from folks who don't upgrade computers every couple years.

Why would you have to buy Office again when you upgrade your computers? Can you not install your licensed version on the new computers?

[bikinchris]

Why would you have to buy Office again when you upgrade your computers? Can you not install your licensed version on the new computers?

I have this problem. Yes, you can install a licensed version on a new computer, but only so many times before you can't register it. Then it doesn't work anymore.
Personally, I am ready to go to Word Perfect. It works better and you can save and open documents as Word files.

[BobbieHan]

I have this problem. Yes, you can start building muscle quickly (https://www.muscleandfitness.com/supplements/best-protein-powders-for-building-muscle/) and install a licensed version on a new computer, but only so many times before you can't register it. Then it doesn't work anymore.
Personally, I am ready to go to Word Perfect. It works better and you can save and open documents as Word files.

I second the Black Dog's question. You don't have to buy a new Office license when you change your hardware. You don't even have to always be up to date with Office versions. For example, many people say that the best Office suite ever is still the 2007 Office.

[biker72]

I hate the idea of a subscription. Adobe is doing the same thing. I have a licensed Office 2013 that I have on 2 computers.

[benb]

Part of the idea with the subscription is definitely steady income, Wall Street types really want all of us software companies doing this.

Changing to recurring yearly contracts was what took the company I work over the top and we ended up getting acquired for a nice sum of money.

There is a flipside though.. on the subscription you're always getting all the updates. Among other things that keeps you from running old versions of the software that have security vulnerabilities.

MS Office is something that I only use sporadically and I use like 1% of the features.. so it's a tough call, I could probably get by fine with a 1990s version. In fact I hate the UI ever since they put the "ribbon" in.

But Office is also a major target for hackers.. so it feels nice to have the subscription and stay current.

I don't have an Office subscription at home, I'm using an old version on one computer and don't have it on another. At work I have a subscription. I do have a Subscription for Adobe Lightroom & Photoshop. Hard to say there, Lightroom and Photoshop were traditionally priced very expensive compared to Office so the subscription doesn't feel so bad.

Subscriptions seem awful from a financial responsibility standpoint... easy to get nickel and dimed into a couple hundred dollars of unnecessary bills each month these days. On the flip side I don't subscribe to a newspaper anymore and we keep our internet at the cheapest possible setup and don't pay for Cable TV, and we play every game we can to keep our Mobile phone bills down... can't believe how many people I meet who don't make that much money who have $300/month of mobile phone + home internet/cable/phone bills.

[Ozz]

I have this problem. Yes, you can install a licensed version on a new computer, but only so many times before you can't register it. Then it doesn't work anymore.
....

This....

Besides, it's not like you buy a box with discs for software anymore...it's all downloads. Heck, most new computers don't even have disc drives.

[ScottW]

If you can't install the version you have on a new computer, and you only have one computer, then I'm in the "buy one license" camp. What specific features of Office are your customers/clients needing you to update so frequently that you'd need a subscription? Word, Excel, Powerpoint files from 2003 ought to work fine for most people on 2007, 2013, and 365.

I personally hate the idea of subscription software for home use, but can see how it might make things easier for IT departments in the long run. My mid-cap corporate employer has gone to 365. From only my perspective as an end user, the update headaches seemed surprisingly minimal and it enables some single sign-on functionality that is appreciated for the various stuff I use. Probably less relevant for a freelancer or home user.

When our company was still on the previous version (2016?) I took advantage of the MS home use program for corporate employees and paid the $10 to install Office on my home PC. That was a sweet deal that everyone should take advantage of if available. I'm still running that previous version at home and everything plays nicely between home & work.

For my work I view cloud storage more as a security vulnerability than a feature that I would actually want, but I'm cynical like that, and maybe it differs depending on what industry you're in. Cloud storage of photos of the kids to share with Grandma, okay fine.

[Dekonick]

I don't mind the subscription but I use office suite often. The 1tb of cloud storage is nice to have as part of the deal. The kids use word and PowerPoint, as well as Google docs - but for work, Outlook is king.

:)

[Clean39T]

Thank you for the reminder to go cancel my Office subscription...

[sfo1]

Google Docs:beer:

[benb]

It's totally nuts in the security climate today for a *company* to not stay as up to date as possible on software like this...

They just write off the costs anyway.

Home is a totally different thing but it's really important to remember MS Office files are a highly popular vector for hacking, phishing, etc..

The dumb thing is I literally can't even name a single feature in 20 years that has been put into MS Office that I've ever really needed.

Maybe my wife... she is an Excel power user.. but that's at work.

Maybe if you're a writer.

But realistically it feels like most of the important features were covered by the mid 1990s versions.

Google docs I find fairly sketchy. I have in the past been employed working on add-on security products for Google Docs.. not really a company I trust and would be much more afraid to trust them for corporate use. You have no idea when they're going to break anything or stop supporting a feature you need. They just don't care since Google Docs is yet another playtime project for their engineers.. Ad revenue covers all the bills for Google so everything else they build is in a very weird state.

[deechee]

I think the fact that you're still on 2011 tells me you should just buy 2019. You've survived this long without the latest for your work. Everyone is switching to SaaS (Software as a Service) because it makes more money. Period.

Unless you're changing your hardware every 2-3 years, I see even less reason to get Office subscription. Office just gets bigger and bigger all the time (with features most people never realize) and it's such a pain when they change the UI and or functionality. Take a look at 2019 (I'm pretty sure its a free download) and tell me some of your tools aren't where you thought they were. Imagine that, every 3-4 years.

My current work is the first time I've use GSuite (google mail, docs etc.) in the workplace and some tools like sheets are horrendous (and I'm really not a power user) but its good enough. Our tech writers aren't using it, but they're not using Office either. I'm sure by the time your Office version is not supported, google docs, or even amazon will have caught up. Who knows, maybe there will be another standard besides pdfs as well.

[MattTuck]

Depending on your needs, you could also consider Libre Office and OpenOffice, which are both free and hosted on your own system.

Google docs if you don't mind Big Brother being the warehouse of your data.

[djg21]

My gigs are freelance and mostly, I work from home. I have Office 2011, but the lovely folks in Redmond have stopped updating it. Office is the defacto standard for businesses I work with (but Google is gaining, interestingly).

So...do I update to the new version of Office by subscription or do I do a one-time purchase? Philosophically, giving Redmond an ongoing revenue stream bugs me, but continual updates and cloud storage are pluses with the subscription. Staying current with Office is, sadly, still just a fact of life among 90% of the firms I deal with.

Anyone faced the same choice? Any thoughts or suggestions appreciated. Thanks!

I resisted and stayed with the one time license purchase for many years. I ultimately buckled and subscribed. The subscription works for me because I have two users in my family, each of whom have multiple devices — PCs, iPhones, iPads. The subscription allows us to install Office on all of the devices, and the Office suite is always up to date. In the end, i would have done worse by purchasing an upgraded Office suite every couple of years.

[fkelly]

Doesn't sound like an option for you for business reasons, but I use Open Office on four computers I support. Make that five, because I have a Linux one laying around and Open Office works fine on it. Reads and writes Word and Excel files too.

I've been forced to go subscription for Adobe products. It sucks. Also amazing how buggy these so-called premium products are.

[C40_guy]

Has anyone purchased an Office license on eBay? Seems like resellers or corporate IT people are selling "excess" enterprise license codes for short money.

Not sure it's within license rules or what problems it might cause... but the $ is pretty short...

[nublar]

https://www.microsofthup.com/hupus/home.aspx

[schwa86]

Doesn't sound like an option for you for business reasons, but I use Open Office on four computers I support. Make that five, because I have a Linux one laying around and Open Office works fine on it. Reads and writes Word and Excel files too.

I am computer savvy, but by no means a power user. I run Linux mint on both my home media server, and a home laptop. I use libre office on them, I have no real compatibility problems with stuff from work, other than graphics intensive power points (readable but wouldn't trust editing them and bringing them back to work environment). I started with Linux nearly 20 years ago, at that point it required a fair amount of experimentation. Now for basic things, it's pretty idiot proof.

[ultraman6970]

Why to pay when you can go freeware? contants updates etc... compatible with word, and if you have a problem just save as word6 and good to go. U need to send something to somebody and worried about compatibility? just save as a word6 or send a pdf to the dude. done.

Have problems with the documents sent but the office 365 the other dude is sending? ask him to save as word6 and good to go again.

Office is a monstrosity that grew every year more and more to the point in which probably nobody use more than 15% of it. THen you have open office that does the same, is update constantly, compatible, super small and is free... and works in different platforms too.

[Joxster]

Buy once.

I get my license's from here.....

https://www.digitallicense.nl/?___store=us&___from_store=default