Microsoft Office 2021
This new version of Office replaces Office 2019 and is not to be confused with Microsoft 365 (formerly Office 365). Microsoft 365 is the subscription service and Office applications are continually updated with new features. Of course, if you don’t pay you will lose access to it. If you buy a perpetual license of Office 2021 you own it forever. But you don’t get new features over time like with the subscription version. Also, it will be supported for only five years compared to the seven years of support for Office 2019. Microsoft isn’t detailing all of the features and changes in Office 2021 just yet. But the LTCS variant will include things like dark mode support across multiple apps, accessibility improvements, performance improvements across Word, Excel, Outlook, and PowerPoint, and features like Dynamic Arrays and XLOOKUP in Excel. There are some changes in what the next version will ship with as well. Microsoft Corporate Vice President for Microsoft 365 continues: Microsoft will provide more details about new features included in Office 2021 closer to general availability. In contrast, Microsoft 365 will continue to get the latest innovations in modern collaboration, advanced security, and intelligent capabilities and ship them as soon as they are available. This new version is for small businesses who want to do a one-time purchase and support it on-prem. Also, for individuals who aren’t quite ready to pay for the subscription or move to the more cloud-based nature of Microsoft 365.
