Microsoft Office for mobile editing now free

Software giant Microsoft has today announced a significant change to its Office strategy for mobile devices: creating and editing is now free.

The company has also released standalone Word, Excel, and PowerPoint apps for the iPhone, as well a new preview of these apps for Android tablets.

Whether you’re using an Office app on Android or iOS, you can create and edit content without an Office 365 subscription. The company is pitching this move as “More of Office for everyone.”

The software maker is releasing updates to both iPhone and iPad today. The iPhone is getting the bigger release, but that’s mainly because the company gave the iPad better treatment when it first brought Microsoft Office to Apple’s mobile platform.

Microsoft is retiring Office Mobile for iPhone for standalone Word, Excel and PowerPoint offerings. You can download these new apps now directly from Apple’s App Store: Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.

Microsoft says these new apps offer “the same beautiful iPad experience, optimized for the iPhone.” Whether productivity software can be “beautiful” is debatable, but Microsoft product manager Amanda Lefebvre did confirm to VentureBeat that they are “built on the same codebase as the iPad apps.”

Source: Venture Beat