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Microsoft Office suite comes with access to popular apps like Word, Excel and Powerpoint but the company charges a fee to use these services.
Office suite gives you Word, Excel and Powerpoint
Microsoft Office suite of apps are expensive which is why most people either use other open source versions or get their official account. But it seems the company is offering a new free version of Office which includes Word, Excel and Powerpoint apps. And like most free lunches these days, there is a big catch that will eventually force you to either pay for these Microsoft apps and move on from them for other free versions.
Free But Is It Good?
Microsoft rarely offers its products for free but this feels like a unique case and the conditions of the free Office suite has multiple riders that people should know. Being a free app you will see ads and that too in different ways.
The report which spotted the free Microsoft Office version says the apps will have ad banners plastered on the sides, and the only way to remove them is to pay for the product. And if that was not enough, you will also have video ads playing frequently, that Microsoft hopes will surely get you to pay for the service or delete it altogether.
But the limits don’t end there with the free version, as Microsoft will not allow you to save the Office files on your computer, and only let you save it on the OneDrive account. If you still want to download the file, you will have to do that from the OneDrive folder.
The incentive to use free services have always enticed people to sign up for them.
We have seen this happen over the years with the Spotify free version that is littered with ads, and similarly, you have streaming apps catering to these users. Microsoft going this route does feel strange but it clearly sees a market where people are happy to sign up and use these popular apps for free, albeit with ads somewhat ruining their experience on these platforms.
Either way, the company stands to benefit from the lure of a free Microsoft Office suite, get more users to try out the apps, and if they feel convinced about using them for the long term, they will pay for the service to get the full benefits.
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