The Problem with Microsoft Office (Premium)

I often get advertising masquerading as news in the Google Discovery feed that I read every day on my iPad and phone. And one of the ads/stories I see the most often is how I can buy a “lifetime license” to Microsoft Office for just $39 or whatever low price. I always shake my head and move on, but after seeing such an ad this morning, something occurred to me. Several somethings.

First, in case it’s not obvious, what’s being offered there is what Microsoft calls a “perpetual” license to the desktop Office suite. Which I would imagine is normally the newest version, called Office 2021. This is a one-time purchase---it’s not a monthly or annual subscription like Microsoft 365---but it can only be installed on one PC (or Mac) at a time. And you just get the classic desktop apps---Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Publisher, and Access in most cases---with no upgrade rights. You’re on that version forever or you can pay full price when a new version comes out. (Full price is anywhere from $150 to $500, depending on the product edition.)

In today’s world of subscription offerings, a perpetual license like this, especially one with so many limits and none of the advantages of Microsoft 365, seems a bit out of touch. But this is done intentionally: Microsoft wants as many customers as possible to subscribe to Microsoft 365 and not just stick with the same tired, never-updated Office version.

And it’s done a good job of making the case. I’ve long argued that Microsoft 365 (previously Office 365), in particular the Family version that serves an incredible 6 users for just $99.99 per year, is a no-brainer. The reason for this is two-fold: the 1 TB of OneDrive storage per user, of course. And access to the Office desktop applications across multiple PCs and devices for each user, not just one PC. If you have a family of three, four, or more people, Microsoft 365 Family is a crazy good value.

But what if you don’t?

I currently do, as it turns out: my wife and I both use Microsoft 365 Family, we have two kids who use it, and my wife’s father is on the subscription too. But this won’t always be the case. And I can suddenly see a future in which maybe a Microsoft 365 subscription, Family or not, is not the no-brainer that it is right now.

The most damning issue, for Microsoft, is that one of the key limitations of the perpetual version of Office---it never gets new features or is upgraded in any way---is in fact a benefit for many users. In my case, I’ll call it a wash, because I do use Microsoft Word every day, all day, and I can’t think of a single new feature that Microsoft has added to this app over many, many years that made much of a difference. Sure, Dark mode support was a nice add ... several years ago. And the recently released (still in preview) Simplified Ribbon/toolbar (whatever it’s called) is a nicety. But facts are facts: I’m a professional writer and I possibly use less than 10 perce...