Rumor: Microsoft to launch Office for Apple's iOS in November

Posted:
in iPad edited January 2014
Microsoft Office, the industry leading productivity suite, will be coming to Apple's iPad, as well as Android-based tablets, this November, a new rumor claims.

Citing a "reliable source," Boy Genius Report said on Wednesday that Microsoft is planning to release the full Office suite for iPad later this year. The loading screen for the application reportedly says "Office for iOS," which could suggest that it will also be compatible with the iPhone and iPod touch.

A version of Office for Android tablets will also reportedly debut in November alongside an iOS version. Other details on the software, such as pricing or features, remain unknown.

Word first surfaced last November that Microsoft was working on an iOS version of its Office suite. It was also said that the Redmond, Wash., software company planned to release an updated version of Office for Mac on Apple's digital distribution Mac App Store.

Word of Office for iPad appeared again this February, when iPad news publication The Daily shared what was said to be a version of Office for iPad in action. However, Microsoft quickly responded to the report and accompanying picture, portraying them as "based on inaccurate rumors and speculation."

Office


February's report suggested that a version of Office for iPad would "soon" be submitted to Apple for review, suggesting it would appear on the App Store relatively quickly. However, since then, no word of an Office for iPad has surfaced.

That report also claimed that Word, Excel and PowerPoint files could be created and edited both locally and online with the iPad version of Office. It was reported as "unclear" whether Microsoft would support other Office applications, such as Outlook or Communicator.

Microsoft already offers a number of software options for iOS, including OneNote, Bing, SkyDrive, My Xbox Live, and the game Kinectimals.
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 80
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member


    So do we wait a few hours for Microsoft to denounce this again, or what?


     


    They're playing the Apple game every time they do that.

  • Reply 2 of 80
    gazoobeegazoobee Posts: 3,754member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Tallest Skil View Post


    So do we wait a few hours for Microsoft to denounce this again, or what?


     


    They're playing the Apple game every time they do that.



     


    Even if they do it, it sounds like more of an "access Office online from iOS" kind of deal, so ... not very interesting unless you are some business dude and the territory is pretty much covered already by others.  


     


    If they were smart, they would release Word for iOS as a standalone app.  


    That has the potential to seriously knock Apple off it's iOS software perch and would decimate Pages if done correctly.  

  • Reply 3 of 80
    charlitunacharlituna Posts: 7,217member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Gazoobee View Post


     


    That has the potential to seriously knock Apple off it's iOS software perch and would decimate Pages if done correctly.  



     


    Only if they charge like $2.99 for it. Otherwise folks will go with Pages or one of the dozen Office clones that gets you all 3 programs for $9.99


     


    Oh and it better launch with iCloud compatibility from day one and retina support etc. And be seriously bug checked up down left right and inside out. Because they are way way late to this game and anything that is missing or goes wrong will get them destroyed in the reviews and ratings. 


     


    Pages is actually pretty good, my only complaint about the iOS version is the inability to use text boxes etc to really layout a page. They went with only supporting their word processing templates and it's limited and a tad annoying. I'm hoping they will add at least their basic page layout stuff even if they don't include things like auto flow between text boxes etc. 

  • Reply 4 of 80
    eksodoseksodos Posts: 186member


    What consumers really want is the iWork suite for Windows.

  • Reply 5 of 80
    anantksundaramanantksundaram Posts: 20,403member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by eksodos View Post


    What consumers really want is the iWork suite for Windows.



    And iLife suite (at, say, something like $99.99) too.

  • Reply 6 of 80


    Everyone needs a word processor to slow their phone to a crawl.

  • Reply 7 of 80
    erikvdoerikvdo Posts: 11member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Gazoobee View Post

      


    That has the potential to seriously knock Apple off it's iOS software perch and would decimate Pages if done correctly.  



     


    How is this going to knock Apple off of anything? Don't forget that Apple is first and foremost a hardware company. They make relatively little money on selling Pages. It is just there to give users a way to create documents, and open and edit Word documents - and that's all just to make the iPad more appealing to a large number of potential customers. MS releasing Office, or even just Word, would be an even bigger selling point for the iPad. The worst case scenario is that Word for iPad is a poor copy of the desktop version, and it won't sell. In that case, Apple will still provide customers the option of using Pages (and the rest of iWork).

  • Reply 8 of 80
    bullheadbullhead Posts: 493member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by eksodos View Post


    What consumers really want is the iWork suite for Windows.



     


    this.  Microsoft Office is overpriced, insecure,  junk.

  • Reply 9 of 80
    erikvdoerikvdo Posts: 11member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by eksodos View Post


    What consumers really want is the iWork suite for Windows.



     


    As much as I would love to see this happen, I think the vast majority of computer users have never heard of iWork and/or don't know what it is. Even if Apple did offer it for Windows, and even if they did market it aggressively, iWork would still be very unlikely to make much headway against MS Office. Though it probably would sell well for those of us who use iWork on the Mac and have to also use a Windows PC at the office. iLife, on the other hand, would probably sell really well, since there really aren't comparable (between cost, ease of use, features) offerings in Windows desktop apps. 


     


    But, again, Apple makes their software to help sell their hardware. The reason that they make iTunes for Windows is to make the iPod/iPhone/iPad useable for Windows users. iCloud is the same. So, we shouldn't hold our breath waiting for the i apps to appear for Windows.

  • Reply 10 of 80
    quevarquevar Posts: 101member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by eksodos View Post


    What consumers really want is the iWork suite for Windows.



    Agreed!  One step further is that I would love to see Apple release their API for Windows so code for Mac and iOS could run on Windows natively.  Not going to happen, but it would sure be easier than writing for different platforms.

  • Reply 11 of 80


    Office for Android ... once again, money well spent by MS. They will break even on that investment ... ah, never. ;-)

  • Reply 12 of 80


    hah. That's a joke.


     


    Microbloat could never get that white elephant cut down to size to run on iOS in such a relatively short timeframe.


     


    Dream on.

  • Reply 13 of 80
    bettiebluebettieblue Posts: 294member


    Microsoft already has a Lync client (communicator) for iOS.

  • Reply 14 of 80
    sockrolidsockrolid Posts: 2,789member


    iOffice?  iOSffice?


     


    Office for iOS Ultra Premium Executive Deluxe Edition?

  • Reply 15 of 80
    johnnashjohnnash Posts: 129member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by eksodos View Post


    What consumers really want is the iWork suite for Windows.



    Obviously you don't actually use the IWork suite.


     


    Or more correctly - You've never used Office and then tried to do the same tasks in an IWork application.  Apple is good at hardware and operating systems, but Office is the king when it comes to business use.  As a Mac convert I'm not playing the 'their OS is better then your OS" game, but in office applications there is no competition, open source or by Apple.  Not to the business user at least.


     


    And for the guy who said "not very interesting unless you are some business dude and the territory is pretty much covered already by others."  I am a business dude.  I work with many business dudes.  A lot of them have IPads, including myself.  If the IOS version of Word/Excel even are 80% as functional as the Windows version then I would buy it in a second just to be able to work productively in my business environment.  If they include Skydrive support, which I figure they will either natively in the app or thru the Skydrive app, then that'd be all I needed.


     


    Remember that Word is the defacto standard for business documents and Excel is the same for spreadsheets.  M$ will clean up on this.


     


     


     


     

  • Reply 16 of 80
    gs turngs turn Posts: 30member


    The newer MS Office is a Bloated piece of garbage. If they simplify it back to the Office 2003 version it might not be to bad, but these newer versions with the ribbons are just garbage. Don't want it on my iPad, I can do just fine without it.

  • Reply 17 of 80
    mstonemstone Posts: 11,510member


    I wish Apple would provide one feature that is essential to me that only MS has. Using IE web browser, you can right click on a table in a web page and export it directly to Excel which is an absolutely huge feature if you use a lot of tabular data that has to be sorted and manipulated. It is next to impossible to do using Safari and Numbers by copying and pasting.

  • Reply 18 of 80
    gazoobeegazoobee Posts: 3,754member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by charlituna View Post


    Only if they charge like $2.99 for it. Otherwise folks will go with Pages or one of the dozen Office clones that gets you all 3 programs for $9.99


     


    Oh and it better launch with iCloud compatibility from day one and retina support etc. And be seriously bug checked up down left right and inside out. Because they are way way late to this game and anything that is missing or goes wrong will get them destroyed in the reviews and ratings. ...


     



     


    Well I did say, "done correctly" so yes, I agree with all of your points. 


     


    Quote:

    Originally Posted by erikvdo View Post


    How is this going to knock Apple off of anything? Don't forget that Apple is first and foremost a hardware company. ...



     


    "software perch."

  • Reply 19 of 80
    bullheadbullhead Posts: 493member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by johnnash View Post


    Obviously you don't actually use the IWork suite.


     


    Or more correctly - You've never used Office and then tried to do the same tasks in an IWork application.  Apple is good at hardware and operating systems, but Office is the king when it comes to business use.  As a Mac convert I'm not playing the 'their OS is better then your OS" game, but in office applications there is no competition, open source or by Apple.  Not to the business user at least.


     


    And for the guy who said "not very interesting unless you are some business dude and the territory is pretty much covered already by others."  I am a business dude.  I work with many business dudes.  A lot of them have IPads, including myself.  If the IOS version of Word/Excel even are 80% as functional as the Windows version then I would buy it in a second just to be able to work productively in my business environment.  If they include Skydrive support, which I figure they will either natively in the app or thru the Skydrive app, then that'd be all I needed.


     


    Remember that Word is the defacto standard for business documents and Excel is the same for spreadsheets.  M$ will clean up on this.


     


     


     


     



     


    I am a business dude and i have no problem _not_ using Microsoft Office.  Libre Office can do 90% of what Office does...the other 10% is just bloat very few actually need. iWork can do the same. To say otherwise is pure BS.

  • Reply 20 of 80
    quadra 610quadra 610 Posts: 6,757member


    Wil it include that horrible ribbon thing?


     


    #usabilitynightmare

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