You’ve probably heard the term Office 365 numerous times, but do you know what it is? Many think it’s a new version of Office and others think it refers to online versions of Office that are accessible via a web browser. Office 365 is neither. It’s a subscription service. Essentially, if you have Office 365 you’re renting the Office apps and/or cloud services from Microsoft. Those services range from the latest Windows and Mac versions of the Office apps to cloud-based servers for email, calendars, online storage and web conferencing.
Now, you may not be too fond of the idea of renting Office, I know I wasn’t at first, but the more I learned about it the more I wish it was available long ago. I like it so much I have two Office 365 subscriptions. One for my home and personal use and another for business use.
With my personal subscription of Office Home, I get the 5 installations of the most current desktop version of Office, on either a Windows or Mac device, 1TB of cloud storage, plus free unlocked versions of Office Mobile on an iPad, tablet, or phone. AND and I can share my Office installations with others. All for $99 a year, or the cost of about 14 lattes. For a single license, that’s under 30 cents a day. If you use all of your 5 licenses, that’s $20 per installation annually, or a little over 5 cents a day. I make sure I get the most value out of my subscription. I use all of my installations and share Office 365 with three other people.
If you want to install Office on at least two computers, Windows or Mac, you can’t beat the Office 365 Home subscription. You get the desktop versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Outlook, Publisher (PC only), and Access (PC only). As a comparison, another plan, Office Personal, includes all of those apps, but it only comes with a single installation for about $70 a year. Since Office Personal includes a single installation, which costs 19 cents a day and Office Home includes 5 installations which cost about 5 cents a day, Office Home is definitely the best bang for your buck.
An Office 365 subscription also means you get new bug fixes and features as soon as they’re released. For example, in my latest Office update, I can now see everyone’s responses to an Outlook meeting request. This used to be limited to only the meeting organizer. Those who have a non Office 365 version of Office 2016 do not get this added functionality.
Here’s a link for buying Office 365 along with a comparison of the Office 365 subscriptions for both home and business.
https://products.office.com/en-us/compare-all-microsoft-office-products?tab=1
Office 365 is compatible with Windows 7 or later, Office 2016 for Mac requires
Mac OS X 10.10. For more system requirements including mobile devices, see this link:
https://products.office.com/en-US/office-system-requirements
Real Geek Girl 
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