Do you use WPS Office, OpenOffice, or LibreOffice in your environment?
Posted by brasilhatli@reddit | sysadmin | View on Reddit | 129 comments
I’ve been talking to our Microsoft partner about volume licensing, and it’s shocking how much they’re charging now. We have about 100–200 workstations that basically just need to open and edit Word and Excel files. These machines are shared on our shop floor, used by employees who don’t even have company email addresses. Shelling out $600 per PC for ProPlus feels unreasonable when the actual usage is so minimal.
I’m considering OpenOffice or LibreOffice, or maybe another alternative like WPS Office, to handle basic doc and spreadsheet tasks. I’ve never used these suites in a work environment, so I’m also curious about any security concerns or potential compatibility issues with .docx and .xlsx files. If we could go this route, it would free up funds for other priorities (like that endpoint management system I’ve been requesting for ages).
Has anyone tried implementing these office alternatives on multiple machines at work? Any feedback on file compatibility, security, or hidden gotchas? Would really appreciate your insights.
hoolio9393@reddit
Word is way better than libre office. Cheap stuff really does suck. Word is a lot to learn anyhow so just buy the word
MiniOozy5231@reddit
If you’re doing any kind of gov contracting, DO NOT USE WPS.
InformationNo8156@reddit
OnlyOffice is damn near a clone of Office, far easier for users than LibreOffice.
RCTID1975@reddit
Unless someone came to you and said "this is too expensive, find another solution", don't do this.
It's guaranteed to bite you in the ass. Either compatibility issues, a learning curve, or people just generally complaining.
Stop treating this like it's your money.
You can get an M365 apps for business license for $8.50/month. This guarantees compatibility, and no complaining or headaches on your end.
Constitutional79@reddit
Agreed
Generico300@reddit
I don't know if I'd go that far. O365 has plenty of complaints and headaches. You're just trading one set for another.
trail-g62Bim@reddit
When you implement a major change that no one asked for, you will get blamed for everything that comes after.
Judy can't find a setting she needs -- that's your fault.
Libreoffice messes up some formatting when it saves the document -- your fault.
The coffee machine is broken. It was working before you took Office away from us. Why did you break the coffee maker?
If you want to implement a change like this, you need to ask yourself what the real world consequences are going to be and then ask yourself if it is really worth it. Saving the company money is likely to just get you a pat on the back. If that is your only reward, then I can't imagine it being worth it.
Changes like this require buy-in from those above you and they require you to analyze what the non-technical consequences will be. Most people just think of the money saved or some technical advantage they will gain. But what the users will see is far different and that needs to be considered as well.
RCTID1975@reddit
You also need to ask yourself what the real benefits are.
Don't make change for the sake of change, or because you "hate Microsoft" for whatever reason.
trail-g62Bim@reddit
Exactly. You have to really think about what you are gaining from the change and weigh it against the cons of the move.
I find when people talk about these scenarios, they often don't properly weigh th pros and cons of the decision and they often don't consider the non-technical ramifications of the change.
slashinhobo1@reddit
IT doesn't understand this comment. People try to save the company money by taking on the hardship as if the money is coming out of their bank account. The money you save doesn't go into your check the majority of the time.
In my environment, the more money you save, the more projects you get to do in the fiscal year.
AdmRL_@reddit
I'd also add to this and say it's better to just keep track of excess or inefficient spend, and wait for the inevitable point every business gets to every few years where they want to trim the fat.
If you're incredibly cost efficient and lean, when that point comes you will be the ony leader and department who turns around and says they can't cut costs - Exec's aren't going to think "Oh they must be cost focused already!" they're going to think you're an incompetent nerd or just not willing.
Instead if it's "inefficient" spending like OP, log it. Wait for the review, then be one of the first to come back with clearly defined and measured savings. So instead of looking like a blocker, you look like the highly efficient mega nerd they should see you as.
TL;DR: Learn the corporate game, people!
SevaraB@reddit
I hate dogmatic responses either way. Cost/benefit analysis is as much art as science and some of us are stronger at finding “hidden costs” to TCO than others. Those of us who have those skills… I can and do use budget before/afters to make my case, come performance review time.
That said, I have a lot of background in a lot of roles in a lot of industries. I don’t typically encourage desktop support jockeys on their first or second position in their career to do this, because they’re likely to miss a lot of those hidden costs.
But at the same time, I’m happy to include them in the process as part of a mentorship program and help them build those skills so they can better lead projects or manage IT teams in the future.
NightOfTheLivingHam@reddit
I will push the standard if they want to pay for it. If they want to take on subscriptions up the ass, then so be it.
Unless they tell me they want to pay once, or not pay at all. If I have a small time client who just needs basic editing and use word and excel sparingly, I'll recommend libreoffice if their budget is tight.
Client who processes records and does everything in excel and word? or accountants that need complex calculations in excel and share data between other agencies? MS Office.
Basic PDF editing and creation? PowerPDF.
Specialized PDF conversions and editing? Adobe PDF.
it all depends on the budgetary constraints or demands of the client or customer.
Big company that makes a few million a year? Fucking pay for the big boy software.
Small potatoes client that has 5 or 6 seats where they open word or excel files on occasion? this stuff can work out fine.
I used to be more of an evangelist for free and open software, and looking to help clients save money, but now only do so if money is an issue. Otherwise I'm not going to push something that will not work for their use case scenario and make me look like some guy's nephew using customers to beta test a theory.
I'll offer them something, but if they demand certain things, I'll tailor things to their needs, not what I want them to use.
That being said in this case, the company has 200 workstations.
I'd go with 365 because at that level, paying $600 per workstation comes out to $120k
365 is half that in a 3 year term (about the lifespan of a workstation before you need to dump it to avoid issues.
JakobSejer@reddit
Aka 'performance penalty'
txmail@reddit
It took me a while to learn this when I was in charge of IT. I got reprimanded for it and loosened up. The company just wanted to know how much stuff cost and to be aware of it, I cannot think of a single thing they ever turned down when making a proposal and there was no IT budget. I did enjoy onboarding as I would get in touch with the new hire and ask them to pick out their equipment (they could have any laptop as long as it was a Lenovo, and any monitor config and any bag / briefcase, keyboard / mouse and also any software load out they wanted. It was rarely anything interesting but a few got some nice loaded Carbon's, some nice 4K monitors when they were a new thing -- a few crazy portable workstations (64GB RAM, Xeon when that was nuts).
RCTID1975@reddit
Lots of folks don't understand that projects like this don't actually save money.
The money is just being spent in salary and downtime for IT and the other employees rather than on the software license.
Doublestack00@reddit
That $8.50 doesn't seem like much until you have thousands of employees.
RCTID1975@reddit
It still doesn't seem like much. Having thousands of employees means you're a very large corporation.
You have to look at more than just the actual number. Context matters greatly here, and the fact of the matter is, it costs money to run a business.
IT's job isn't to make a decision based solely on cost alone. Our recommendations should be based on what's best for the business. Do your job, and let finance do theirs.
Doublestack00@reddit
Assuming that is why my current company moved to Google several years ago.
With 6500 -/+ employees being on Google vs MS they are saving a fortune.
Glass_Call982@reddit
If these are "Shop floor" computers they are likely shared devices so you'll need apps for enterprise to do shared device activation.
RCTID1975@reddit
I don't know of a single shop or warehouse floor that has individual logins for everyone.
Now if that's a licensing concern, that's a different question, but there is only single activation here.
BarefootWoodworker@reddit
Came to say something similar.
OpenOffice and LibreOffice work, until they don’t.
There’s numerous little gotchas with both when trying to interoperate with MS Office. Formatting goes all to shit and sometimes things go missing.
walks-beneath-treees@reddit
> There’s numerous little gotchas with both when trying to interoperate with MS Office. Formatting goes all to shit and sometimes things go missing.
This hasn't been the case for a lot of time. Compatibility is good and I haven't run into a document that couldn't be opened in MS Office with any loss of functionality. Every new version has an improvement in such compatibility.
koshka91@reddit
Isn’t web based M365 free with a license of ExchangeOnline
FedUpWithEverything0@reddit
You're thinking of outlook Web version :)
koshka91@reddit
No web based word, excel?
FedUpWithEverything0@reddit
Not free no
No_Advance_4218@reddit
No. ExchangeOnline is its own license and thats all it has. Microsoft 365 Basic has Exchange + Web Apps. Its a little bit more money, I want to say $1ish
koshka91@reddit
Ah, got it
TheFluffiestRedditor@reddit
There's a $AU15/month subscription service, which gets you O365, and the web-version of the Office apps. That might be what you were thinking of.
SpycTheWrapper@reddit
I don’t think so
GeorgeWmmmmmmmBush@reddit
100%. You’re not being the hero you think you are.
Constitutional79@reddit
I’ve used open office and libre at home. I haven’t seen it used in a professional environment. I think the learning curve would be a lot for end users. But the systems works fine, seems intuitive to me, but people love their Microsoft. I have seen an increase in the number of commercial use of Google workspace and their office suite
stking1984@reddit
My 2 cents. I forget the comments made by others all the time. It’s not your money it’s the business entity you work for. Sure you could look to save the company money. But do the math. How small or large your company is might dictate whether you even bother. If you are a global company I wouldn’t even consider this. M365 all the way. Small org of 100 people. Maybe I would, but in the end it’s likely not your decision anyway. Escalate the decision to someone who has authority to make risk decisions on behalf of the org and wipe your hands of the responsibility as that’s likely not your job.
What is your job? To do the tech work, communicate the situations and escalate decisions to management as appropriate who get paid more than you do and can decide if they want to save the money or accept the risk. You just have to make sure you communicate the options and the risk.
Good luck
ultraspacedad@reddit
We have Office 365 for like 20 employees who use those pieces of software. For the people with exchange only inboxes I install OnlyOffice and it's basically the same if not better for most users. Now I'm installing OnlyOffice for most people because they like that it looks like 2007-2012 office and works the same. The bonus is you can also use it for editing PDF's and filling them so you can get rid of Adobe.
ravensholt@reddit
Office 365 is more than just Excel, Word, Powerpoint.
You mention Excange. The keypart of that is Active Directory integration.
Now OnlyOffice doesn't seem like such a good alternative, as soon as your employee's rely on interoperability an integration between Office applications, such as how well OneDrive integrates with Teams, OneNote and the whole Office suite in general.
ultraspacedad@reddit
Not really at all. Most users don't use any of that extra in office 365 standard. By creating an exchange only account, it still gives them login access and everything else associated to office 365. They just don't get access to usage of the apps. Only office is a great alternative because they can view and edit files without having the full license. Even the users that have office 365 standard say it's easy. They use shared drives for everything and document control is handled by a direct system. The last dumbass that was running the system didn't even use azure entra id and was still on a. Local domain
ravensholt@reddit
Really? You know what each and every user of MS Office use and don't use?
You have no idea how many people use and rely on these tools every single day.
Microsofts "killer app" is Outlook.
Do you know why? It's not the emailing or the calendar ...
And It's also not only because of Active Directory / Exchange (or AzureAD).
It's all the integrations, not only with Excel, but also 3rd party tools, Dynamics CRM / Salesforce, PowerBI etc. etc. Business people live inside Outlook, and they hate if they have to change context - hence why you can have whole sessions of Dynamics CRM or Salesforce running inside (kind-of like an iFramed version).
There's millions of users out there, every single day, using these tools.
Business rely on these tools, to run efficiently.
Once a business reaches a certain "mass" , that's when they start having internal Microsoft-strategies.
That's why companies such as:
- Accenture
- Avanade
- TCS (Tata)
- Tech Mahindra
- Deloitte
- Capgemini
- McKinsey
And more, small and large, consultancies around the globe earn billions each year selling and implementing these products.
Claiming "most users don't use any of that" is not only stupid, it's outright delusional.
ultraspacedad@reddit
I'm talking about my users champ. You clearly didn't contextualize what I said and went on a rant. You don't understand the absolute nightmare I signed up to clean. I know what normal people do with office 365 and how it's suppose to with. Then there is my place where everything was setup wrong or half done with limited licenses
Generico300@reddit
Depends on your environment. OneDrive integration is little more than a security risk in my field.
ravensholt@reddit
Most certainly it depends on the environment.
The fact is though, that , by large, companies that outgrows a certain size, have "Microsoft" strategies. They use the whole suite, O365, Azure, Dynamics CRM (or Salesforce as it so beautifully integrates with Outlook, and MS has a partnership with SF), PowerBI.
That's just the reality, and it's because MS offers a level of integration that no one yet has been able to compete with.
Microsofts most powerful "killer app" is Outlook, by far. Business people live inside Outlook, because it not only does emailing, calendar, but also integrates with a whole slate of tools, both their own and 3rd party tools.
theMezz@reddit
FYI...
"The German state of Schleswig-Holstein has decided to transition approximately 30,000 government PCs from Microsoft Office to LibreOffice. This move is part of a broader initiative to achieve digital sovereignty, enhance security, and reduce costs by adopting open-source software solutions."
https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2025/03/13/updates-on-schleswig-holstein-moving-to-libreoffice/
AppIdentityGuy@reddit
Do you know how many times German cities and states have tried this exercise?
shikkonin@reddit
Often enough and successful enough that Microsoft had to bribe them to stay or go back to MS...
ravensholt@reddit
No. Microsoft didn't have to bribe anyone - that's a common lie amongst OpenSource enthusiast.
In the end, it disrupted the whole workflow , people were less efficient, and that overall came to a much larger cost. See the real truth hurts - it didn't work out. If it had worked so well as you claim, they would never have gone back, ever. Stop lying to yourself.
pdp10@reddit
What are your sources on that? E.g., do you read German?
ravensholt@reddit
I'm not the one making crazy accusations here - To claim Microsoft bribed a municipality (politicians) would be stuff for headlines.
I'm sure the media would love if you could share some light on who received these so called bribes? No?
Ping me when you have "sources" ;)
Ich kann nicht nur Deutsch lesen, ich spreche es auch.
pdp10@reddit
Let me clarify: do you have a pointer for
For Munich or any other entity in Germany. I'm always looking for sources, especially those in English.
shikkonin@reddit
The bribes are on the official record.
Stop lying to yourself.
pdp10@reddit
Fewer than one may think. The 2014 news about Munich was a PR nothingburger, for example.
unccvince@reddit
OnlyOffice is very good for viewing and changing basic stuff in a document that originated from a Word or Excel file. That should work for what you want to do and OnlyOffice is OpenSource and Free.
Personnaly I prefer LibreOffice for longer documents of which I am the original author.
I use MSWord when I receive an extremely poorly presented document (Legal, is that you?).
Same reasoning applies to spreadsheets.
BJMcGobbleDicks@reddit
We deploy LibreOffice across all our endpoints from our RMM. Finance gets Microsoft Office.
Anxious_Youth_9453@reddit
Are you in North America?
daxxo@reddit
Why does that matter?
Generico300@reddit
Some countries have policies to encourage or mandate OSS use in government. Pretty rare in the US though.
Anxious_Youth_9453@reddit
I have simply never heard of this in North America, but I have seen higher adoption in Europe.
daxxo@reddit
Ah ok, gotcha
BJMcGobbleDicks@reddit
Yes In the US. We’re in the southern states, and we try to use Linux for our servers where we can, and LibreOffice on every endpoint.
blbd@reddit
Y'all're ahead of the curve y'hear? 😉
enigmaunbound@reddit
How's your mama and them?
ohyeahwell@reddit
ma'nem
Obi-Juan-K-Nobi@reddit
Punctuation is too correct to be believable. 😉
Doublestack00@reddit
Our finance also get Office. The other 6000 people use Google.
ScruffyAlex@reddit
Same here. About 200 employees.
stevewm@reddit
We do at my company, and have done so for years. We are in a similar situation. We are a retail store chain, and slightly more than 75% of our 350 workstations are shared access. Office document needs are super basic. Most retail floor employees don't have a company email/Google Workspace account (there really isn't a business need). So LibreOffice it is.
LibreOffice is part of our standard software load on every machine. It has full GPO support, so we disable macros and set it to save in MS Office formats by default. Interoperability has never been an issue in several years we have used it. LibreOffice compatibility with MS Office is actually quite good these days. Even VB Macros work if it isn't something complex. We used OpenOffice before, but switched to LibreOffice when it became clear which project was advancing faster. (and LO added GPO support first).
Corp. office staff do generally get MS Office. But these days though, most have largely switched over to using Google Workspace for everything as they find it easier.
The only exceptions are a handful of sales people that use this terrible quoting software that is nothing but a stupidly large and complex Excel macro. It actually does mostly work in LibreOffice, but very, very slowly. These people are given a standalone Excel license. This software is on the way to being retired thankfully.
pdp10@reddit
We use at least LibreOffice; I use it only a few times a year. A gotcha is: fonts. Microsoft broke font-compatibility instead of breaking file-compatibility.
LibreOffice forked from OpenOffice.org in 2011. There's no reason an end-user organization should consider it.
Besides WPS, there are the options of (German) SoftOffice/FreeOffice, and the Calligra Suite.
chaosphere_mk@reddit
Documentation, 3rd party integrations, and vendor support are all benefits you'll lose. People with office skills are going to complain when they come in and have to use something else.
But those might not be things that are valuable for your use case. Those computers will last some number of year. If they last 6 years that's 100 a year for ProPlus.
You could get a M365 F1 license at $2.25 per user per month and have them just use the web versions.
Based on number of users, one of these options is cheaper. Personally, if you're a 1 man IT shop, I'd prefer to have vendor support on everything I'm expected to support because I'd be too busy to be a full on expert on every bit of end user software. Have to be a master of none in that role. Or at least that was my experience when I was in that boat.
ItsAdammm@reddit
F1 is read only and probably also still has some weird footnotes about maximum screen size.
natefrogg1@reddit
Good point with the screen size, our retail stores all used 10” iPad airs but are slowly being upgraded to the larger 13” air, the larger size is not supported under that licensing plan. It surprised me when we realized that screen size mattered with licensing
natefrogg1@reddit
Most of ours are $150 per user per year with the office 365 business standard whatever they call it, $600 is a lot
xortingen@reddit
WPS is like a malware. I highly suggest you stay away from it. I had to format my PC to get rid of it as you cannot simply uninstall it.
ravensholt@reddit
WPS is malware, how exactly? just because it's "chinese" ?
In that case, Windows is Malware, and everything Microsoft ever touched is malware.
Oh oh ..
Oracle Linux is malware too, and so is Red Hat also!
Sincerely someone who's used WPS for years.
I can confirm, it's not "calling home" , my firewall would've caught that.
Oh, and it uninstalls just fine via Add/Remove programs in Windows.
Same on Linux, very easy to remove again.
xortingen@reddit
It has nothing to do with it being chinese. I didn’t even know it was Chinese until now. I don’t know why you act so butthurt about some stupid software. It is malware because it installs weird popups everywhere. Quite intrusive and you can’t get rid of it easily. Uninstall removes the WPS alright but not all of it. You still see it everywhere in menus, registry everywhere. Just search for “how to remove wps” and you’ll see.
Just because some other apps are shit, doesn’t justify wps being shit. It may not call home, but it’s still intrusive shit.
Kurgan_IT@reddit
I have customers that use a mix of MS office and Libreoffice, and they are just fine. I have people that cannot use Libre because they refuse to learn the small differences. I even have people that don't want to use MS office because they have learned Libreoffice and they don't like MS Office.
So unless you are using complicated excel files that contain macros, or you are using Access, then yes, you can use Libreoffice but you need to have the people understand that the user interface is different.
Hoosier_Farmer_@reddit
Libreoffice wherever possible. Open source is peer reviewed for security (unlike microsoft, which has had multiple multiple security incidents with their office products), and deployed and trusted by corporations, health and educational institutions, governments etc around the world. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LibreOffice#Users_and_deployments
RCTID1975@reddit
I mean, so is MS office by thousands of times over
Hoosier_Farmer_@reddit
which would be relevant, if OP was asking about MS.
jmbpiano@reddit
You're literally the one who was making the comparison in the first place.
rmeman@reddit
Yeah, but who can forbid you to run Libre Office if so they feel ?
Lonecoon@reddit
LibreOffice deployment starting this year. We're not doing complex spreadsheets, we're not doing document creation, it's all memos and basic spreadsheets. No one seems to have any complaints, but we only have 80 users, of which 40 ever use a computer for anything meaningful.
walks-beneath-treees@reddit
We're using LibreOffice where I work, and so far it's been good. There was indeed a period of adaptation in which users had to look for things in other places, and the only rough edge I found was setting up custom page numbers, which is easier on MS Office. Other than that, I think it was a success.
LibreOffice is compatible with Microsoft Office, and every new version they improve such compatibility. And in our case, we were using Office 2010, so it was definitely a nice update, since 2010 was starting to not open a couple of documents.
Plus, it has many interfaces, one of them looks just like MS Office, though in my experience, users preferred the older one for some reason.
In regards to Free software, this sub is heavily biased towards Microsoft. I mean, if you feel like you're up to the task of supporting LibreOffice (or any free software for that matter) and feel like a paid support isn't worth it and can save money for you in future endeavors, then by all means use it. I believe free software can and should be used whenever it can, but I do understand that some of it isn't on par with paid software on more complex work. But really, what kind of complex work are people doing on, say, Excel, that couldn't be done with an actual accounting software ?
Anyways, just my two cents.
ohyeahwell@reddit
Uh we use M365 Business Premium. $18/user/mth. Well worth it.
IAdminTheLaw@reddit
Where are you getting that price? We're paying 20% more than that.
ohyeahwell@reddit
That’s via insight as CSP. T-Mobile can beat their price and act as a CSP even if you don’t use their cellular services. Insight is 6% discount, T-Mobile is 10%.
I haven’t used T-Mobile as CSP but I’m trying to use them as leverage to get a better deal out of insight.
ravensholt@reddit
Good luck finding an alternative to AzureAD / Active Directory and Exchange / Outlook.
Again, it's so typical that someone like you only consider "Office" to be "Excel, Word, Powerpoint".
MS Office and the whole eco system (O365) is so much more than that.
I'm willing to bet, the employee's are also using MS Teams, which integrates nicely with the rest of the ecosystem, including MS Project, Onenote, One Drive etc.
If you can find an opensource alternative that integrates all the applicatons cheaper, then by all means, propose it to your C-levels ..
Working_Astronaut864@reddit
Stop delivering things to your shop floor that need Excel and Word. You probably have a data process that needs improving that will eliminate the need for full versions of this software to be available in the first place.
EstoyTristeSiempre@reddit
100% this, also I'm guessing they're also using generic accounts, breaking all the accountability across the files.
If someone deletes / edits / fills wrong or false data, you have no idea who did it because there is no accountability.
Apprehensive_Bat_980@reddit
I used to get away with Excel and Word viewers for shop floor a few years back. Word viewer didn’t like files with comments, so lads got annoyed. “Well you need to buy this licence/OEM then”.
thereisaplace_@reddit
So much this. Process improvement is the answer.
plumbumber@reddit
I don't see any reason why not to use libreoffice as long as its basic text editing and spreadsheats. Wouldn't recommend it for something like accounting or CEO/CFO though. You could always test it for a couple of weeks and if it doesn't work out you could always switch to Microsoft?
jpStormcrow@reddit
Why do you need proplus
NightOfTheLivingHam@reddit
My question to OP is, how much value will this bring to your customer? is the $600 for pro plus a deal breaker for your company's bank account or a line item for next year's tax deductions?
Honestly, if you're working for a place that has 200 workstations..
365 software licenses is up your alley.
$600 per seat?
$120,000 one time cost for what? 3 years? Also if it turns out half the workstations do not need that, and workstations die, you have to keep a sheet of all the licenses out there what is associated with what?
Breaks down to 40k a year.
Vs.
8.99/year for 365
Which is $1798/mo for 200 workstations
which is $21,576 a year
which is 64,728 in 3 years.
365 is going to be cheaper to run the software, easier to manage the licenses and transfer them to new hardware, you also may be able to reduce costs as you will find not every machine will need a license.
where if you bulk order 200 machines and part of the deal is that you get office with every single one, you may find most may not need it.
at the end of the day it depends on the headache you are willing to deal with and how much money you want your employer to spend.
ZAFJB@reddit
Do your sums. That 'expensive' Office licence costs about $1 per user per day.
In terms of labour costs that is minutes per user per day.
How much more labour per day will users have to spend working around limitations and incompatibilities of of Open/Libre office? If they waste just 5 minutes a day of their time on average, M365 wins.
And Open/Libre office has no email functionality - so you have to spend money on that.
NoTime4YourBullshit@reddit
So here’s the thing about LibreOffice is highly capable and has very good compatibility with MS Office. But like most open source projects, it’s not very polished in the user interface department. It looks like something from the 1990s or early 2000s. That alone leaves people with the impression that it’s trash. And of course, it will favor its own format when saving a document, making it un-openable on MS Office unless you specifically opt to save in that format.
So in short, if you have a technically-minded user base that can handle it, LibreOffice is a fine choice. But if your user base would swear their car runs better after taking it through a car wash, then you probably better stick with Microsoft.
NightOfTheLivingHam@reddit
I have clients who actually love it for that reason. They like the simpler UI from the 90s. Of course they're older.
autogyrophilia@reddit
Somebody has not used Libreoffice in the last 10 years ...
I mean the interface has not improved .
mishrashutosh@reddit
Doesn't MS Office support OpenDocument format for a while now? If you save in OpenDocument format in LibreOffice you should able to open those files in recent versions of MS Office without issues. OpenDocument is actually "open" and has much better cross-office suite compatibility than OOXML.
NoTime4YourBullshit@reddit
TBH I’ve never tried it. I’m always going the other way around; opening MS-Office docs w/ LibreOffice.
mishrashutosh@reddit
I do save to OpenDocument these days, but I get what you mean. Also in a corporate/sysadmin context I would simply not bother with anything outside Microsoft. They are too entrenched and trying to bring about change is not worth the headache.
Alert-Mud-8650@reddit
In the options you can tell it to default to Microsoft formats and not complain about it
NoTime4YourBullshit@reddit
You can, yes. But it’s still a config the user has to set, and unsophisticated users will only learn that the hard way, which makes it an IT support problem to deal with.
Alert-Mud-8650@reddit
Yeah, the small number of times I installed it. I made the settings change manually. I agree, most users would complain to IT before trying figure it out themselves.
blbd@reddit
You can push that config in. NBD.
bluehairminerboy@reddit
A customer of ours use LO since they're too cheap to pay for an Office licence - it works ok for simple stuff but bigger more complex Excel documents don't come across very well and it doesn't play well with OneDrive
themikeosguy@reddit
OpenOffice is no longer getting updates, and has multiple unfixed security issues over a year old. Pretty much all development activity in recent years moved to LibreOffice, the successor project.
jay-mini@reddit
yes LibreOffice
BWMerlin@reddit
If the staff need basic access to Microsoft Office applications then the Web versions are probably fine which is included in Microsoft Business basic for $9 per user per month.
You could also look at the F1/3 series of licences and see if they fit.
WRX_manning@reddit
Business Basic + Intune Bababy. 150mm company right here with nothing more.
ItsAdammm@reddit
F1 is read-only, f3 is more expensive than basic.
F1 is a great value as an add-on license for entra p1 features if you don't mind living in a gray area
R2-Scotia@reddit
I've used Libre for years as I run Linux. It's about as compatible with MS Office as Office:Mac is, i.e. the handling of pptx files is mediocre other stuff is pretty good.
_AngryBadger_@reddit
Vast majority of my clients on are 365 For Business. They're familiar with office and the cloud integration is very helpful for them. For the cost they're happy which means I get to be happy.
If there absolutely has to be an alternative then I to with Libre Office.
bukkithedd@reddit
No. It makes zero sense for us to do that, given our dependence on the entire O365-suite of solutions.
robinhooddrinks@reddit
We ran into the same issue with Microsoft’s insane licensing costs and decided to test LibreOffice and WPS Office across about 150 shared workstations. Here’s what we found:
Security-wise, both are fine, but since these are shared shop-floor machines, endpoint management is key. We locked them down using an MDM solution that lets us control app usage, enforce policies, and push updates remotely. That setup made a huge difference in preventing unnecessary IT headaches.
If you’re considering moving away from Microsoft, I’d say go for it—but make sure your device management strategy is solid, especially if these machines are being used without assigned user accounts. We found that a good MDM platform made the transition much smoother.
Would be curious to hear how others have tackled this!
txmail@reddit
If I had to use an alternative, I would actually use OnlyOffice -- but mostly because of the document server features / option.
1116574@reddit
I help a guy run his small operation with libre office (and some Linux) - he's very happy, but he's also no power user only needing basic functionality. In my opinion working in a bigger office with m365, 80% of users there could switch to LibreOffice (95% of you exclude Excel lmao), and many would view the option of old office 97 interface as a plus even lol
At home I use only office and LibreOffice, and find both good for my use cases. If your use case is just to open files on the shop floor and perhaps make some light data entry, I see no reason not to try LibreOffice or onlyoffice.
If you want to use more powerful features and have them work with office 365, it's somewhat of an uncharted territory in orgs, and most comments here are about that it seems.
photosofmycatmandog@reddit
No. I
chum-guzzling-shark@reddit
i use libreoffice and keep it updated with powershell for a handful of users that literally use a single spreadsheet and have no need for email
Aggressive_Ad_5454@reddit
Make a credible case for adopting Libre Office.
Then put on your steel-toed boots and meet with the Microsoft reseller. Say “I just want to let you know we can’t handle the O365 license fees for our shop floor workstations. So our best alternative to a negotiated fairer price for these machines is to discontinue our license for these machines. Can we get a fairer price in any way?”
It is true that Libre Office is a good alternative. So you have negotiating power.
erathia_65@reddit
Onlyoffice with commercial licence and nextcloud, all selfhosted, 250 users, never had any problems since launch, also all Linux users with at least a quarter of power users.
Interesting_Ad_5676@reddit
Libreoffice does the job quite well. However I would be very happy if iWork could run on linux.
jbruff@reddit
iWork
Brufar_308@reddit
Ms office in the front office and for managers. Libre office for shop floor machines.
iceph03nix@reddit
We use Libre office for generic accounts on Kiosk computers that aren't tied to 365 when they need to do excel data entry
Kyla_3049@reddit
Look at OnlyOffice. WPS is not free for commercial use, OpenOffice hasn't been updated in ages, and LibreOffice likes to mess up the formatting of MS Office files.
wheresthetux@reddit
The best approach (IMO) is to find a tech savvy coworker in the department or unit that is on the floor doing the work. Bounce it off of them, ask for an example of the documents if you don’t have them already, and enlist that coworker to help you by piloting the idea.
Off the cuff, if it’s a few forms or docs that function internally to the company then you may have a good shot. If you receive and send things to outside people or orgs or deal with a variety of docs, then you’ll probably be better sticking with Microsoft.
It all depends on the details. Writing letters or memos, sure. If you have the excel power user with all their macros and formulas from over a decade of work, then probably not as a drop in replacement.
illarionds@reddit
Now is probably a great time to do it - ride the wave if European companies ditching US tech, even assuming you yourself are in the US.
And LibreOffice at least does the job just fine, especially if you're talking about very basic use (which it sounds like you are).
People won't love you for it though.
Substantial_Tough289@reddit
We use Libre Office mixed with Office 365 and older versions of Office.
The default install is Libre Office.
jooooooohn@reddit
You can get Office Business Basic (browser apps) for $4.75/month if you don't need Teams... otherwise Apps for Business at $8.25/month or Office 2024 Home & Business for one-time $249
spetcnaz@reddit
LivreOffice, whenever and whenever I can get away with it.
If there are no compliance, business, or annoying C suite needs/requirements then LO in a heart beat.