When it comes to getting work done, few software suites are as prominent as Microsoft Office . The quintessential tool for office productivity, Office includes all kinds of apps to help you with different types of work, whether it's writing documents, making presentations, or processing large sets of data.
Microsoft Office may be irreplaceable for many, but the truth is there are plenty of alternatives out there that have a lot going for them. Many of those apps are free, which already makes them a more appealing choice by default. But some of them may even have other benefits, too. So let's take a look at some free Office alternatives you might want to be using instead of Microsoft's version.
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5 Google Workspace
Of course you knew about this one
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I know I'm preaching to the choir here, but Google Workspace (that means Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides) is obviously a fantastic free alternative to Microsoft Office. It's based entirely on the web, but you can run it offline with the proper browser extension, so it doesn't require a persistent internet connection as some might think it does.
Google's Workspace apps have a look that's both pretty modern and very simplistic in a way that's more reminiscent of the old Microsoft Office UI design. If you prefer that older style, this may be better for you than Microsof'ts official apps right out of the gate.
Where Google Workspace really excels is real-time collaboration. Microsoft also offers this feature, but it's generally much more seamless with Google's apps, with real-time updates being more accurate and fewer restrictions around co-editing. Plus, Google's web apps are much more polished because they're designed for the web first, whereas Microsoft offers a better experience with its desktop apps (which cost money), while the free web apps can feel a little less optimized at times.
Thanks to the massive popularity of Google, this is already a pretty common option, but if you haven't checked it out yet, it's worth a try.
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4 LibreOffice
The go-to open-source suite
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I'm going to be totally honest here: I'm not actually a big fan of LibreOffice. Personally, I find the UI to be a bit more clunky and not very visually appealing. However, spend enough time online and you'll find that a lot of people love LibreOffice, so it would be hard not to include it.
LibreOffice's main advantage over Microsoft Office is two-fold: it's free, and it's open-source. That means you can use it without paying a dime, and you can inspect the code or even make your own contributions if you're so inclined. It also comes with no strings attaches, meaning you don't have to create an account to access any of the features offered by the suite. It all just works out of the box without any attempts to track or get data from you, which is always nice.
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LibreOffice also has a notable advantage that no other option on this list has: a proper database manager. Indeed, in addition to Writer, Calc, and Impress (the alternatives to Word, Excel, and PowerPoint), there's also LibreOffice Base, which is a free open-source alternative to Microsoft Access, something we don't see very often. If you want to create and maintain complex databases for all kinds of information, this is the way to do it. What's more, there's also LibreOffice Math, which gives you ways to write out complex mathematical formulas and make them presentable.
Otherwise, LibreOffice is a very capable tool that uses a more old-school interface that's more reminiscent of Office 2003 and earlier, which some people prefer to the new Ribbon approach. And if you're looking to change it up, LibreOffice can also be customized with add-ins that significantly enhance the experience.
LibreOffice also has the benefit of being on all major desktop platforms, including Linux, Windows, and macOS, while Microsoft only support the latter two.
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3 MobiOffice (formerly OfficeSuite)
Versatile and with free cloud storage
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My colleague Parth Shah recently sang the praises of MobiOffice in a dedicated article, so of course I had to include it here. I ahve also used MobiOffice myself, and indeed iot's a pretty caapable suite of tools that you can use for free, though you will be pushed to pay for the premium version here and there.
MobiOffice comes with the essentials, including alternatives to Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, as well as a PDF tool for splitting, merging, and otherwise manipulating PDF files for free. It does require an account, which is a little less than ideal, but that gives you 20GB of free cloud storage, which is space for plenty of documents if you're not using it for anything else. If your preferred cloud storage for photos is elsewhere, this gives you some room to offload documents from there and focus that space on things like photos.
In terms of the UI, MobiOffice goes for an interesting approach where it kind of resembles the Office ribbon for the most essential controls within each app, but most of the features are actually in a more classic-style menu along the top, so it kind of bridges the gap between old Office and new Office. It actually imitates Microsoft Office in a few other ways, including an auto-save feature that relies on the MobiDrive cloud storage (though it oddly only works with MobiDocs, the Word replacement), and a similar File menu, too. It's familiar, but different enough that it might be more appealing to old-school Office users.
The inclusion of PDF tools is also very welcome, though it's not like this will replace Adobe Acrobat. It can only do things like filling in forms, combining files, or convert PDF files to Word documents. Still, a very convenient tool to have for free.
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2 WPS Office
Tab-based productivity
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One option I used for quite some time on my PC was WPS Office, which was known many yuears ago as Kingsoft Office, mostly available on mobile. WPS Office is much better than it used to be, though, and there are some cool things about it.
First and foremost, it includes the tools you'd expect, with replacements for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, plus some PDF tools that you can use for free (though some are also paid). One great thing about WPS Office is that it comes with a ton of templates you can use for free to create specific kinds of documents and files, but a personal favorite feature of mine is that instead of each app being a completely separate entity, the entire suite is tab-based.
What that means is, if you have a project that involves documents, presentations, and spreadsheets, you can keep all of it in the same window, so it's all very self-contained. If you want to separate a document, you can create a new workspace (window), which also supports its own tabs, so you have a lot of flexibility with how you organize your files.
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On top of that, WPS Office also includes 1GB of free cloud storage (if you sign up for an account) which can already house a few documents. For a lighter use case, that's not too bad, and the cool part is it enables co-editing with other people that also use WPS Office. Co-editing seems to only work on the web, but because of the tab interface, the whole experience still feels pretty uniform across the board.
UI-wise, WPS Office is uses a Ribbon-like UI that's very similar to Microsoft Office, but it's a bit more compact overall, so it gives you a bit more screen real estate for the document itself. Overall, WPS Office is one of the best alternatives to Microsoft Office, and things like tab support make it potentially even better than the real thing.
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1 SoftMaker FreeOffice
A very robust free option
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SoftMaker's FreeOffice suite is probably my favorite Office alternative out there and I have good reasons for it. Of course, it's completely free of charge, though SoftMaker does also make Office NX, a paid version of the suite that has a more robust feature set.
Regardless, the FreeOffice suite is more than good enough for most users. One of my favorite parts about it is that it lets you choose between the Ribbon interface that Microsoft Office is known for today or the more classic menu options that old-school users still prefer. I'm much more partial to the former.
I also love that there's nothing shady going on here. You can download and install FreeOffice completely free of charge and without creating accounts or signing up for anything. It's just yours to use without worrying that your data will end up in the wrong hands.
FreeOffice includes TextMaker (a Word replacement), PlanMaker (an Excel replacement), and Presentations (a PowerPoint replacement), so most of your basic needs are covered. It also does support SQLite databases for things such as client information, which might be useful for filling in certain templates, and overall, the feature set here is very solid for the use most people will give an Office suite like this.
Given the familiarity of the UI, I'd say this is one of the easiest options to try if you're moving away from Microsoft Office, and I doubt you'd regret it. Plus, unlike Microsoft Office, FreeOffice is available on Linux in addition to Windows and macOS.
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Why spend money on Microsoft Office?
With all of these fantastic free options available, I'd say most of the people paying for Microsoft Office would probably be just fine using a free alternative instead. Considering Microsoft Office 2024 is a $150 purchase or a $70 annual subscription for Microsoft 365, I'd much rather save that money and put it towards something else instead, considering I can do everything I need with a tool like FreeOffice. Of course, that's not counting things like cloud storage, of which you get 1TB with Microsoft 365, but not everyone needs that. I'd still recommend checking out these options if you want to work with a lower budget.