Microsoft is reportedly discontinuing support for Office, which includes Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, and Outlook, for Chromebook users starting from September 18.
According to TechCrunch, the tech giant is not abandoning the popular mobile device altogether. Instead of an app that is downloaded, Microsoft is encouraging users to go to the web instead.
Since 2017, Microsoft has offered its Office suite to Chromebook users via the Google Play store.
“In an effort to provide the most optimized experience for Chromebook customers, Microsoft apps (Office and Outlook) will be transitioned to web experiences (Office.com and Outlook.com) on September 18, 2021,” Microsoft was quoted as saying in an email statement by the tech website.
Microsoft’s statement also noted that “this transition brings Chromebook customers to access to additional and premium features”.
The Microsoft web experience will transition its base of Chromebook users to the Microsoft 365 service, which provides more Office templates and generally more functionality than the app-based approach provides.
The report said that the web approach is also more optimized for larger screens than the app.
In terms of how Microsoft wants Chromebook users to get access to Office and Outlook, the plan is for customers to, “assign in with their personal Microsoft Account or account associated with their Microsoft 365 subscription“, according to the statement.
Chromebooks run on Google’s Chrome OS, which is a Linux-based operating system. The report said that chromebooks also enable Android apps to run, as Android is also Linux based, with apps downloaded from Google Play.
It’s important to note that while support for Chromebooks is going away, Microsoft is not abandoning other Android-based mobile devices, such as tablets and smartphones, it added.
