Microsoft Office 2016 for Mac Launches for Office 365 Subscribers

Microsoft is releasing the final version of Office 2016 for Mac today. After previewing the software to testers for the past four months,


Office 2016 for Mac is ready and available immediately to Office 365 subscribers. Office 2016 for Mac marks nearly five years since the last release of Office for Mac back in 2011, and Microsoft has made some modern changes to support how Office and OS X have changed over the years. There’s a new user interface that feels like a mix of the fresh Windows design and Office for Mac 2011. The result is the familiar Ribbon user interface that fits in with the OS X theme and features like sandboxed apps, fullscreen view, and Retina screen optimization.

Microsoft has also integrated its OneDrive cloud storage into Office 2016 for Mac, meaning you can quickly access recent documents you may have been editing on your smartphone, tablet, or Windows PC. There’s even co-authoring support to allow several people to simultaneously edit a document. Microsoft has also added the familiar Windows shortcuts to its Office 2016 for Mac apps so you can can use ctrl + shift instead of cmd + shift and others to navigate around. That’s particularly helpful if you’re someone who regularly switches between a Windows PC and Mac.

Office 2016 for Mac ships with five apps: Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and OneNote. They all feel like they’ve finally caught up to the Windows equivalents, making this a significant release for Microsoft. Office 365 Home and Personal subscribers can download Office 2016 for Mac today, and a standalone version will be released in September.