Microsoft Office 2013 launches with new subscription option

By Meghan McDonough Published April 4, 2013

Image used with permission by copyright holder

Yesterday, Microsoft’s Office Twitter account, @Office, announced plans to launch Office 2013 today, January 29, with an event in New York’s Bryant Park. The ubiquitous office suite has been making the rounds in enterprise settings for the last couple of months, but today’s the first time that the general public can get their hands on it.

Along with Office 2013 comes a new way to experience and pay for the popular suite: a new subscription version called Office 365 Home Premium. Though Microsoft Office 365 has been in pubic beta for over a year, today marks the rental suite’s formal debut. For $99.99 a year, users can access Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Outlook, Access, and Publisher on up to five different devices – including tablets and Macs – at the same time. Microsoft sweetens the deal even further by offering 20GB of SkyDrive online storage and 60 minutes of international calls for Skype users.

Recommended Videos

Office 365 Home Premium is a lot like Google Drive, which saves all of your work in the cloud and gives you access to all of your work no matter where you are. In other words, you’ll never have to worry about leaving that important file on your home computer again.

For users who eschew the subscription model for software, Office 2013 is also available in the traditional pay-once-and-install format. Office Home & Student 2013 is available for $140, Office Home & Business 2013 for $220, Office Standard 2013 for $370, and Office Professional Plus 2013 for $499. The least expensive version, Home & Student, does not include Outlook, which may entice email fanatics to upgrade to Home & Business or take a second look at Office 365 Home Premium, which includes access to the email behemoth.

Don’t want Microsoft Office at all? Check out our suggestions for the best Microsoft Office alternatives.

Editor’s note: This story was modified on launch day.

Meghan McDonough

Contributor

Meghan J. McDonough is a Chicago-based purveyor of consumer technology and music. She previously wrote for LAPTOP Magazine…

Topics

Computing

How much is Microsoft Office? 

The Microsoft Office app on PC.

Microsoft Office, or Microsoft 365 as it's known today, is the full suite of Microsoft work-related applications. It includes iconic programs like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook, as well as more modern additions like Teams and OneDrive. You can use a number of these for free in their web versions, or you can pay a monthly subscription to use their downloaded, local versions.

There is no single price for Microsoft 365, as it's only available on the software as a service (SAAS) model, but the monthly cost differs depending on whether you're a home user or business user, and whether you're looking to subscribe for just yourself, or an entire team.

Computing

Launching Windows 11 apps could get up to 50% faster thanks to this new tech

Microsoft Store Ads on a Dell XPS Laptop.

Windows Latest has spotted a recent support document post from Microsoft confirming native Ahead of Time (AOT) support has been added to the Windows App SDK. According to Microsoft, this could bring major improvements to the launch times of Windows 11 apps. In its own testing, Microsoft has measured a 50% reduction in start times and around an 8x reduction in package size.

The Windows App SDK exists to help developers use classic desktop app frameworks to make apps with access to modern APIs that can be used across all kinds of Windows devices.

Computing

How to set an ‘Out of Office’ message in Microsoft Teams

Person using Windows 11 laptop on their lap by the window.

Many people use Microsoft Teams regularly to communicate with colleagues both inside of the office and remotely. It is considered one of the most efficient ways to ensure you can stay in contact with the people on your team, but what if you need to let people know you’re not readily available? Microsoft Teams has a method for you to set up an "Out of Office" status for your profile to let staff members know when you’ll be gone for the afternoon, for several days on vacation, or for an extended period.
Where do I go to set up my ‘Out of Office’ status for Teams?
It is important to note that your Microsoft Teams and Outlook calendars are synced. This includes your out-of-office status and automatic replies. So, whatever you set up in Microsoft Teams will reflect in Outlook. Similarly, you can set up your out-of-office status in Outlook, and it will be reflected in Teams; however, the former has a more straightforward instruction.

The following steps will work whether you use Microsoft Teams online or on the desktop.