Office For Windows 10 Detailed As Office 2016 Announced

Microsoft may be streamlining their efforts with Windows, but they're about to split Office in two. At yesterday's Windows 10 party, we got glancing looks at Office on Windows 10. Today, we get a better idea of why that was. Office for Windows 10 is not all Microsoft has in store for us. There's also Office 2016, which will be available to other platforms — and probably not quite as cool as Office for Windows 10. Luckily, Office fans won't have to wait long, as Office 2016 comes out in the second half of this year.

According to the Office blog, Office 2016 "will remain the comprehensive Office experience you're long familiar with, best suited for a PC with keyboard and mouse." That likely means Office for Windows will be the only version that supports touch, or has special features baked-in to take advantage of touch screens.

Office 2016 will have "compelling new experiences", but so far sounds like an iterative (but still welcome) upgrade for Office.

As for the rest of Office — that is, Office for Windows 10 — you're getting some interesting and compelling new tools and functionality. Down the line, touch is a big deal for Office and Windows 10.

Perhaps one of the coolest features is PowerPoint's real-time annotation, which allows you to make notes on slides as you scroll through them. One Note looks brighter and more intuitive, too, with the Office ribbon bar up top. Excel even goes touch-capacitive, which makes cell selection and formatting easier than ever.

For more on Office for Windows 10, check out the video below.

Source: Office Blog