Alternatives to Microsoft Office

Desktop suites

	Microsoft Office 2007	Word Perfect Office X3	Star Office 8	Open Office 2	iWork '08	Lotus Symphony
Rating	8.0	7.0	7.0	6.0	7.3	TBA
Pricing & licensing
	£492 (U) £359 (P) £327 (SB) £291 (S) £90 (HS)	£235 (u/g £115)	£52	free	£55	free
OS support
	Windows (XP, Vista)	Windows	Windows Linux Solaris	Windows Mac Linux Solaris	Mac	Windows Linux
Features
File formats	MS DOC DOCX XLS XLSX PPT PPTX free add-in for PDF exports	Corel files MS DOC DOCX XLS XLSX PPT PPTX ODF exports PDFs	MS DOC XLS PPT ODF exports PDFs	MS Office ODF	MS DOC DOCX XLS XLSX PPT PPTX Mac formats MOV SWF exports PDFs	MS DOC XLS PPT ODF exports PDFs
WP	Word	WordPerfect	StarWriter	Writer	Pages	Documents
SS	Excel	Quattro Pro	StarCalc	Calc	Numbers	S'sheets
Pres.	PowerPoint	Corel Pres.	Star Impress	Impress	Keynote	Pres.
Email	Outlook	Mail	StarOffice email	n/a	n/a (inc. with Mac OS)	n/a
DB	Access (Pro edition)	n/a	Adabas D	Base	n/a	n/a
Drawing	n/a	n/a	StarDraw	Draw	n/a	n/a
Support plans
Phone	90 days free then £46 per request	£9.95 per incident	3 free requests in first 60 days then $25 (~£12) per request	n/a	90 days free then £35 per incident	n/a
Email	90 days free then £46 per request	unlimited, free	3 free requests in first 60 days then $20 (~£10) per request	web	web	web

Online suites

	Thinkfree Office 3	Google Docs & Spreadsheets	Zoho Office
Rating	7.3	7.3	6.7
Pricing & licensing
	$50 (£24.45) download; free & paid online versions	free online beta version	free online beta version
OS support
	Windows, Mac, Linux; Java-enabled browsers	IE6+, Firefox 1.07+, Mozilla 1.712+ Netscape 7.2+ browsers	IE, Firefox, Safari 3 browsers
Features
File formats	MS DOC, DOCX, XLS, XLSX, PPT, PPTX; exports PDFs	MS DOC, XLS, PPT; ODF; exports PDFs	MS DOC, XLS, PPT; ODF; exports PDFs
Word processor	Write	Docs	Writer
Spreadsheet	Calc	Spreadsheets	Sheet
Presentations	Show	Presentations	Show
Email	n/a	Google Mail tie-ins	n/a
Database	n/a	n/a	Creator
Drawing	n/a	n/a	n/a
Support plans
Phone	n/a	n/a	n/a
Email	24h email + web	web	web

Product	Date	Editors rating	Member rating	Price
Product	Date	Editors rating	Member rating	Price
Microsoft Office Standard 2007 Microsoft Office Standard 2007 is a worthy upgrade if you need to make sleeker-looking documents and presentations to share with others, and Outlook is better than ever. However, you can stick to your current software if you don't feel that it lacks anything.	30 Jan, 2007	7.7	4	£291
WordPerfect Office X3 Standard Edition Corel's WordPerfect Office X3 is a very good productivity suite with enough enhancements to warrant an upgrade. Microsoft Office users, though, should wait for Office 12.	18 Jan, 2006	7	9.4	£235
StarOffice 8 StarOffice 8 is an impressive upgrade of Sun's bargain productivity suite. It's a good buy for small and large businesses, but if you need an email program and a photo editor, consider Corel's WordPerfect Office 12 Small Business Edition.	29 Sep, 2005	7	8.5	£45
OpenOffice.org 2.0 OpenOffice.org 2.0, the freeware version of Sun's StarOffice 8, is a great deal for small-business users who don't mind browsing online forums for technical support. But enterprises are better served by StarOffice 8.	7 Dec, 2005	6	8.8	£0
iWork '08 Although Microsoft Office 2007 offers deeper features, particularly for number-crunchers, Apple's iWork '08 is a strong Mac productivity package and a pleasure to use.	23 Aug, 2007	7.3		£55
ThinkFree Office 3 ThinkFree Office 3 is a low-cost alternative to Microsoft Office that lacks advanced tools but offers a free online component that's a handy work-in-progress for frequent travellers. Still, we'll wait for improvements to the suite before relying on it for staple office tasks.	5 Dec, 2005	5.3	7.5	£29
Google Docs & Spreadsheets Google Docs & Spreadsheets beta gracefully merges word processing and spreadsheets within an online service that lets you collaborate with other users.	28 Nov, 2006	7.3		£0
Zoho Office Suite beta Zoho Office Suite beta has strong potential, but it's not yet a final product, and its spreadsheets and presentations applications need more work before you can rely on them.	30 Oct, 2006	5.7		£0

Talkback

Quite how OpenOffice scored lower than StarOffice is strange given that they are, for all intents and purposes, *exactly* the same.

Note Reader's gave OpenOffice 8.8.

Sun recently released StarOffice as part of Google Apps - admission, it would seem, of its lack of market penetration compared to OpenOffice.

1000193068 2 October, 2007 21:16

Thanks for those comments,

Readers' ratings are really valuable - in fact it could be argued that they are the only ratings that really count. We pride ourselves here on the thoroughness of our reviews but we can only go so far.

To really get an accurate picture of how a product stands-up to businesss use - we need the community to provide us with as much feedback as possible. That is a lot of the reason behind why we have made the changes we have to ZDNet.co.uk - to break-down the barriers between journalists and readers and allow people with information and opinions to communicate with each other.

The whole StarOffice, OpenOffice debate is interesting - think Novell are also launching their own flavour and will be interesting to see how that tastes given their tie-up with Microsoft.

andrewdonoghue 3 October, 2007 16:16

eDeskOnline has all that Google DeskTop or Zoho has, plus an accounting and inventory element. Thats why my clients and myself have been using it for two years. Suggest a look at it.

Sanjiv@Swarup.info 13 December, 2007 16:44

Change the Title to "Why Use Microsoft Office"

Based on readers reviews, high cost, speed (unless you buy the latest PC every 2 years), slow bugs fixs & prone to virus attack, why use Microsoft Office?

metsteve 15 February, 2008 11:44

Right now Microsoft are ahead maybe because they've had over 10 years to perfect their Office suite. now, the internet makes it possible for competitors to operate at low budgets.
Right now Microsoft can afford to charge us close to £500 for a disc, who'll pay that in the future when you can get Open Office and others for free?

harpless 15 February, 2008 17:37

Let's not forget how Microsoft Word achieved dominance over the previous market leader WordPerfect: Microsoft bundled Word with sales of Windows, and prevented OEMs from doing the same with WordPerfect.

http://www.news.com/Novell-sues-Microsoft-for-sinking-WordPerfect/2100-1012_3-5450285.html

Nice.

Chris Rankin 18 February, 2008 08:51