Ultimately, if you are looking curiously at Office for iPad and already have an Office 365 subscription then go ahead and download the apps – they are part of the package and it doesn't make sense not to use them, even if it is very infrequently.
#Microsoft office for ipad free#
In 2013, Apple announced that the iWork suite on both iOS and OS X were to be made free (down from £5.99 per app), removing the need for any other applications, especially as iCloud performed the same function as Office 365, and Pages, Keynote and Numbers could export in Word, PowerPoint and Excel-friendly formats. Less than fifty days into his job as CEO of Microsoft, Satya Nadella pushed Office for iPad out into the world – but it was arguably still too late.
In many ways, the failings of Office for iPad are down to Steve Ballmer's hesitation concerning rolling out the suite. But is this the audience or usage Microsoft is aiming for? The answer is likely no, and Microsoft could've worked to address this. Of course, Office 365 in and of itself has merits that extend beyond the iPad and into the desktop and laptop world – syncing across devices on storage that is secure and won't fail, for example – so there is a possibility that people who already use Office 365 will download the suite onto their iPad just for the hell of it.
The unfortunate situation for Office for iPad is that because Office 365 is required, users automatically get versions on their desktops or laptops and so the incentive to download Word or Excel on an iPad is removed. Those who make lots of presentations – teachers, lecturers, business people, and so forth – should definitely consider PowerPoint for iPad. The iPad – especially the mini – lends itself to this function since it is easy to hold and glance at, has a long battery life and doesn't require a button press to change slides. Especially when paired with an Apple TV, PowerPoint thrives as an option for displaying presentations – effects and all – to an audience. If Office 365 is out of your budget, PowerPoint is the only app that makes sense as a free one, without the ability to edit, since displaying a PowerPoint presentation is a much more manageable task than creating or editing on an iPad. Microsoft should've drilled down on the basic features of each and worked on putting those in the iPad app, leaving the more complex features for the desktop versions. Both suffer from over-complication, especially Excel, which leads to a pretty poor experience, especially when you consider that you are paying for it.
While this isn't Microsoft's fault, the implementation of both is sub-par and steps could have been taken to remedy this. PowerPoint and Excel are slightly different stories, however, as they require far more screen space than is provided by the iPad. All-in-all, though, Word for iPad is solid and is definitely comparable to Pages, especially when editing more complex Word documents. Both are pared down for the iPad and both have similar drawbacks, including speed (although this varies from device to device) and higher-end features, such as checking versions of a document for changes. When compared to Pages, from Apple's own iWork suite, Word held its own.
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