Microsoft will release a new version of Office this week, designed for people who don't want to subscribe to Microsoft 365. The standalone version of Microsoft Office 2024 is now available for both consumers and small businesses, and includes fixed versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, and Outlook for Mac and PC.
Office 2024 includes many of the updates that Microsoft has been offering to Microsoft 365 subscribers over the past few years. Microsoft last released a standalone version of Office in 2021, and this new version of Office 2024 includes improvements to core applications, as well as accessibility and user interface changes.
Office 2024 has a new default theme, featuring Microsoft's latest Fluent Design principles that match Windows 11's visual changes. Microsoft has also added accessibility-focused improvements to help Office users find potential accessibility issues in documents, slide presentations, books and emails.
The biggest changes in Office 2024 can be found in Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook. Microsoft has added new features in Excel for using text and arrays in worksheets, along with a new IMAGE feature that can pull images from the web. Excel 2024 can now also reference dynamic arrays in charts, which can be automatically updated instead of pinned to set data points. Microsoft claims that the overall speed and stability of Excel 2024 should also be improved.
In PowerPoint, Microsoft has added the cameo feature, which allows you to insert a live camera feed into your slides. PowerPoint also has a new recording studio feature that includes recording functions for narration, animations, transitions, and inking. You can also add subtitles or subtitles to videos and audio files on slides, making presentations much more accessible.
Outlook 2024 includes improvements to search so you can get more relevant results for messages, attachments, contacts, and calendar entries. This latest version of Outlook also includes more options for meetings, including the ability to automatically shorten meetings. Mac users can also customize the swipe left and right gestures in Outlook.
In Word, Excel, and PowerPoint you can now easily insert an image from an Android mobile device, and Microsoft also supports version 1.4 of the OpenDocument Format (ODF), which includes a variety of new improvements. Word and PowerPoint also include the ability to like and react to comments on documents.
Word 2024 users will also be able to recover a session if their PC crashes. Word will automatically open all the documents you had open before your PC crashed, ran out of power, or Word simply closed unexpectedly. OneNote 2024 users will also have access to the new inking and drawing experience.
Microsoft says Office 2024 will require a Microsoft account and an Internet connection, but if it's anything like Office 2021, you'll only need an Internet connection to install the suite, activate it, and get security updates. Office 2024 will run on Windows 10 and 11, as well as the three most recent versions of macOS.
Office 2024 will be available in two different editions. Office Home 2024, priced at $149.99, includes Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote for PC or Mac. If you want Outlook, you'll need to purchase the $249.99 Office Home and Business 2024 version, which also includes the rights to use the applications for commercial purposes.
