Microsoft launches Office 2013, Office 365 starting Rs. 400 p.m!

Microsoft has finally opened the curtains on Office 365 and Office 2013, the latest and the greatest versions of their uber popular Office suite. And, the pricing for these products has something new for the consumers this time around.

Microsoft will be offering monthly and yearly plans to go along with the traditional off-the-shelf purchase of Office products.

Buying a Traditional Microsoft Office license outright is unaffordable to most people – The prices starts from Rs. 10,000 and upwards in India. However, the new pricing, especially for Office 365, is different and will be affordable to many.

But first, let us understand the difference between Office 2013 and Office 365.

Differences between Office 2013 & Office 365

As far as the products included in both packages go, they are really the same. They both include Word, Excel, Powerpoint, OneNote and other additions based on the license you pick up.

The main difference is the way they both have been licensed. Simply put, Office 365 is offered on monthly or yearly lease, while office 2013 is offered for outright purchase. The good thing about Office 365 is that Microsoft is allowing users to share a single license among 5 different PCs (or Mac machines) or even some mobile devices.

what this means is Instead of buying Office flat-out as you did traditionally , you will pay a monthly (Rs. 399.99) or annual fee (Rs. 3999.99), that buys you automatic software updates, 20GB of extra storage on SkyDrive (Microsoft’s Cloud storage service), 60 Skype world minutes and use of all the Office programs on up to five computers or tablets.

Pricing

From the pricing structure it is clear that Office 365 is targeted at students and home users while the Office 2013 will be targeting the commercial and business users.

My Take

Personally, I really like the licensing approach that Microsoft has taken. The leasing sort of option will not only make it affordable, but will go a long way in bringing down piracy of office products which is wide-spread. Additionally office 365 brings added benefit of usage across multiple devices, enabling members of a family to take advantage of single license on different PCs or tablets.

We will soon review Office 365 version and bring you the review so you are further informed on pros and cons of going for such licensing.

For more details head over to Microsoft Office website