Next year will be crucial for many Microsoft customers. The company will end support for Windows 10 on October 14, 2025.
Next to that, it will also end support for Office 2016 and 2019 on the same day. This means that any of the included applications won’t receive updates anymore after that date.
This includes Word and Excel, but also Skype for Business 2019, Access 2019, or OneNote 2016.
Here is the full list:
Office suites: Office 2016, Office 2019
Office applications: Access 2016, Access 2019, Excel 2016, Excel 2019, OneNote 2016, Outlook 2016, Outlook 2019, PowerPoint 2016, PowerPoint 2019, Project 2016, Project 2019, Publisher 2016, Publisher 2019, Skype for Business 2016, Skype for Business 2019, Visio 2016, Visio 2019, Word 2016, Word 2019
Productivity servers: Exchange Server 2016, Exchange Server 2019, Skype for Business Server 2015, Skype for Business Server 2019
While the programs continue to work after the end of support date, bugs and security issues will accumulate that won’t get fixed by Microsoft anymore. Microsoft won’t offer technical support either anymore.
Note: There is a good chance that micro-patching service 0Patch will support the two Office versions with updates after support end. A subscription is available for about $25 plus tax per year.
Customers may upgrade to a new version of Office, e.g., Office 2024, which Microsoft released recently, or subscribe to Microsoft 365, which includes Office applications.
The “End of Support: Know your options” table by Microsoft shows products that run out of support and Microsoft’s recommendations.
Obviously, there is no mention of Office alternatives that users may switch to. LibreOffice is probably the best option when it comes to that. It is an open source Office application that comes with pretty much the same apps as Microsoft Office. And it is free to use.
It offers good compatibility with Office document formats, but compatibility is not 100%. While most home users may not notice these differences and issues, Enterprise and business users may.
Do you run any of the applications? What will you do once support runs out? Feel free to leave a comment down below.
Libre Office is great beenusing it and Notepad++ for years.
+1 for LibreOffice, but yes, “…compatibility is not 100%”. If you’re doing presentations at clients’ offices, you need to be using Powerpoint, or else bring your own hardware.
But for the usual Word/Excel stuff, Libre is fine. I haven’t had MS Office on any of my machines for over a decade.