Why 365

The name change is more than a little confusing, but the actual subscription packages remain the same. Here is a breakdown. As of April 21, , the official branding of Microsoft's productivity suite has changed from Office to just Microsoft The new naming convention reflects Microsoft's strategy of providing a single complete productivity platform for its customers.

From the customer's perspective, there is no separation between Windows 10 , Office , and Azure —it is all just one platform, the Microsoft platform. We'll have to wait and see how well this new strategy plays out. Fortunately, from the viewpoint of current subscribers, the change from Office to Microsoft is not going to have much of an immediate practical impact.

In general, the subscription you had on April 20 is the same as the subscription you had on April 21, only with a different name. However, in the interest of clarity and the inevitable annual renewals, this may be a good time to go over just what Microsoft packages are currently available.

As was the case when the productivity suite was called Office , each subscription package of Microsoft includes various familiar applications such as Outlook , Word , Excel , and PowerPoint. Each subscription package will also include various levels of services like Exchange, SharePoint , OneDrive , and Teams.

You will have to decide which package is right for your needs. Disclosure: TechRepublic may earn a commission from some of the products featured on this page. TechRepublic and the author were not compensated for this independent review. Figure A shows the current business-oriented subscription packages for Microsoft This package was formerly referred to as Office Business Essentials.

Everyone who needs to contribute to or edit a document or spreadsheet, or presentation, etc , can work on the same version and get real-time changes rather than having multiple version floating around that have to be combined. You can also share direct access to your files, rather than send files as attachments. This means people can make changes to one file rather than having multiple copies. Versioning is included in case you need to go to back to an older version.

Check the Office Blog to get an idea of what kind of upgrades you get with an Office plan. There are several different Office business plans available with different programs and features. Not everyone in your company is going to need the exact same thing. You can check out a breakdown of the different plans here. Office is a subscription-based service, meaning you pay a low monthly fee per user rather than a large lump sum up front.

This can be helpful from a cash flow perspective. Some of our favorites include:. There are options to overcome some of this if you have an expected downtime. Yearly subscriptions could be a happy medium, though — often you can get a discount for going this route. Get Fresh Updates On your job applications, and stay connected. Download Now. Start networking and exchanging professional insights Register now or log in to join your professional community.

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