Aug 23, 2013 Im new to the Apple word and have just purchased an MacBook Pro. Im slowly finding my way around however i am missing Microsoft word. Does anyone have any good suggestions for the Apple equivalent. I don't mind purchasing however if there are any free or cost effective solutions that would be great.

While many people believe that they are 'locked' into using Microsoft Word for all their document creation needs, it simply isn't true. Over the past few years, there have been many Microsoft Word and Office alternatives that were released and that have gained traction. Now, there are alternatives to the costly application from Microsoft, many of which are free.

Today we're going to explore ten alternatives to Microsoft Word that you can quickly and easily start using today. Some will be online and some will be downloadable applications that can be installed on your local computer, but all will enable you to wean yourself off of Microsoft Word and still be productive.

• 8 Free Microsoft Word Alternatives I use a lot of software, and as a programmer myself, I totally understand the need for programmers to make a living from their work. But, I don't like the new trend toward subscription-based software.
• Microsoft does offer a stripped-down online version of Word free of charge with your OneDrive account, so if you're committed to Office that should be your first stop.If you're looking outside the.
• Jul 01, 2021 If you're going to let go of the Microsoft world and you're looking for a free word processor for Mac, your best bet is to join the Google alliance. Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides are the Mac and Windows equivalents and the three direct alternatives to Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.
• For Microsoft Word and Office aficionados, the best possible free online alternative for their document editing needs is definitely Word online, which comes as part of the Office Online suite. Although free MS Word web app is not a full-fledged version of its paid counterpart, it allows you to open, create and edit Word documents online.

This is because they can all work in conjunction with the applications you already use with MS Word. Take your everyday PDF converter tool, for instance. Working with PDF documents is difficult and you may think it even harder if you swap out an application in your usual software lineup. This simply isn't true, though. Able2Extract Professional, for instance, lets you work easily with any MS Word alternative there is. Simply convert your PDF to Word and then import or upload your converted results into any one of the Word processors in this list. You won't miss a single beat!

So if you need a good list of free alternatives to MS Word, look no further. Let's get started on our tour of ten free alternatives to Microsoft Word.

Online Microsoft Word Alternatives

Sometimes it's easier to create and collaborate online in real-time than by editing and managing multiple versions on your local hard drive and sending the files via email. The web-based word processing applications below will not only let you create the documents online but also quickly and easily share them with others.

Dropbox Paper

Dropbox Paper is a free online word processor offered by the online cloud storage provider. To start using it, you will need a Dropbox account. Once logged in, you get full access to the online suite. The minimalist interface is very intuitive and its simplicity allows you to focus on your content. You can also do a number of things that go beyond creating a textual document. You can add rich media, such as audio, video and images. Dropbox Paper also allows you to access apps that let you embed Trello cards, Youtube videos or SlideShare decks. Other collaborative features include document link-sharing, creating and assigning checklist items to members or embedding one of your Dropbox documents. Dropbox Paper, overall, does an excellent job at creating dynamic documents you can share and access online.

Office Online

For Microsoft Word and Office aficionados, the best possible free online alternative for their document editing needs is definitely Word online, which comes as part of the Office Online suite. Although free MS Word web app is not a full-fledged version of its paid counterpart, it allows you to open, create and edit Word documents online. Also, it offers some additional benefits of online software tools. For example, the ability to access and see updates from co-authors to your docs literally from anywhere in real time with only an Internet connection and the latest 2016 version. You can share and collaborate on documents. An equally alluring feature of Office Online is its cross-platform compatibility. So, if you're a Chromebook or Linux OS user, MS Word web app is the most elegant way to get access to Microsoft's document editing features - for free!

Google Docs

Google Docs allows you to create, collaborate and share documents, spreadsheets, presentations, drawings and even forms. Google Docs is packed with features, which can be further extended with various add-ons. While it will automatically save the file online and store it there, you can also have the documents published as a web page, downloaded or emailed as an attachment in Word, ODT, PDF, plain text or RTF formats. You can invite collaborators to work on the document with you or only allow others to view it without the ability to edit. And if you are apprehensive of having to depend on the Internet connection for document processing, don't worry. You can enable Google Docs offline access and keep editing your documents even when you are disconnected from Internet. All it takes is a free Google account.

Etherpad

Etherpad is an online document editor primarily intended for collaborative editing in, as the site claims, 'really real time'. It's an open source, highly customizable tool for online document collaboration with friends, fellow students and classmates, or colleagues at work. One of its advantages, especially appealing to users who are reluctant to use services which require email registration, is that there is no sign up with Etherpad. All you need to do is start a new pad and share the link to it with your collaborators. You can also invite them by email if you prefer. After that, you can start working on the planned writing project together, in real-time, even if you are miles apart.

Zoho

Zoho offers around 20 free online applications including Writer for word processing. You can link your Zoho account to your Google and Yahoo accounts, as well. The Writer's interface shouldn't cause anyone problems as it is comfortably familiar. When working online there's always the risk of losing data due to a lost network connection, accidentally closing your browser or having your browser crash. Luckily Zoho automatically saves your documents for you, as you finish typing. Zoho Writer is well-equipped with features that allow you to work easily online: two-way desktop sync, large file transfer, encryption, file recovery, two-step authentication, in-app chat, and more. You can import and work with MS Word documents, allowing you to insert images, and edit content as needed. Zoho Writer offers all the standard text formatting and document creation features and can export to DOCX, ODF, PDF, Latex, RTF, TXT and even HTML. It can plug into Echosign for digital signatures, publish the document to a blog or make it public for all to see. Zoho Docs is completely free to use.

Downloadable Microsoft Word Alternatives

Some people are reluctant to cut the ties to their local computer and put all their work and business documents online. If you're one of them and don't want to rely on an Internet connection, here are several free word processing applications to round out our list. These you can download and install on your local computer. Take advantage of all the desktop features of MS Word without the hefty price tag!

Apache OpenOffice

The Apache OpenOffice package actually includes six programs that all use the same engine making them inherently the same and extremely easy to learn and use. The 6 applications included in the Apache OpenOffice suite are: Writer (word processor), Calc (spreadsheets), Impress (presentations), Draw (diagrams and illustrations) and Base (database manipulation) and Math (mathematical equations). Writer can even natively do some things that Word cannot, like open PDF files without the addition of a plug-in or commercial add-on. As the software is open source it is maintained by a large community meaning help and bug fixes are freely available and quickly created. The downside to Writer is that it can only open DOCX files without the ability to edit and save them. You can install this suite on Windows XP to Windows 10, macOS and Linux.

LibreOffice

LibreOffice is another open source Microsoft Office alternative and a successor of the OpenOffice.org project (in 2010, Oracle/Apache OpenOffice and LibreOffice projects went separate ways). LibreOffice is distributed as a “monolithic software” consisting of seven components: Writer, Calc, Impress, Draw, Base, Math, and Charts. LibreOffice Writer is a free and powerful word processor available for Windows, Linux, and Mac. This Microsoft Word alternative can edit and save DOCX file format meaning that if you often collaborate on documents with Microsoft Office users, LibreOffice Writer is your best choice. It offers multi-language support, a spelling and grammar checker, ability to export in PDF and EPUB ebook format, AutoCorrect and AutoComplete features, a lot of extensions and document templates, and more regular updates and major and minor releases than Apache OpenOffice.

Jarte

Jarte is based on Microsoft WordPad Engine, but is still free. There is a paid version of the software that adds on some extra functionality, but the free version is more than adequate and fully compatible with Word and WordPad documents. Features include an ergonomic tabbed interface, small resource requirements, portability, support for touchscreens, and quick loading time. It also has built-in spell checking and can export to HTML and PDF files. Jarte allows you to insert images, tables, hyperlinks and everything else that you have come to expect from Word. Jarte contains no ads, trial periods or crippled features and is funded through user purchases of the Jarte Plus version.

WPS Office

WPS Office is a free document processing suite whose WPS Writer app will serve you well as a Microsoft Word alternative. WPS Office 2016 Free can open and save to a long list of popular file formats native to those applications like docx, doc, and more. You can get the application in languages other than English: French, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Polish and Russian. The suite has the same familiar look and feel of MS Office with one exception--it has a tabbed viewing window, so you can open more than one document at a time. And also worth mentioning is WPS Cloud, the company's cloud document storage service that offers up to 1GB of free storage that you can use. This is perfect if you're trying to find a free Word alternative that's not only scalable for teams, but can also be as collaborative and seamless as its Microsoft counterpart.

SoftMaker FreeOffice

SoftMaker FreeOffice is another great free suite that offers a full featured Microsoft Word alternative. The suite's TextMaker application allows you to focus on creating documents just as you would in MS Word. This suite offers up essential editing features and even a handful of basic templates for creating and editing documents. Tables, charts, shapes and graphics are available along with standard text formatting options. This application provides you with everything you need. The entire suite is available for Windows, Linux, and Android, so you can keep your document processing tasks going even while away from your desktop.

Whether you are looking for a free locally installed Microsoft Word alternative or an online one for easier collaboration and online file storage, there are many available. The ten that are covered in this article are only the tip of the proverbial iceberg, but should give you a good starting point. The obvious giants in the arena are Google Docs and Openoffice.org which are probably also the most popular, though Zoho does offer a wider selection of applications. In the end, the one that best suits you will be the one that offers the features you need the most.

No matter which one you pick, you're guaranteed a fully functional, robust word processor at zero cost. If you also want a completely free PDF viewer with powerful features for Windows, Mac, or Linux, give Slim PDF Reader 2 a chance today!

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Apr 04, 2020 While most free alternatives to Microsoft Word try to provide at least some form of support for the word processing file format developed by Microsoft, only a few succeed. To ensure that your.doc and.docx document will look just like you want them to, we recommend you convert them to.pdf. Download Apache OpenOffice For OS X. Apache OpenOffice is free to download, use, and distribute. Download it now, and get: Writer a word processor you can use for anything from writing a quick letter to producing an entire book. Calc a powerful spreadsheet with all the tools you need to calculate, analyze. 7 Best Alternatives To Microsoft Office Suite — 2019 Edition. Its own set of Google Docs web apps can be used as the best alternative to Microsoft Office apps as they are available for free. 11 Great Alternatives To Word For Mac (Free & Paid) 1. Nisus Writer Pro. Google Docs (Free. Growly Write (Free). OmmWriter (Free). OpenOffice (Free). NeoOffice (Free). Microsoft office word 2010 download mac. LibreOffice (Free).

You don't have to leave Microsoft Office if you decide to switch from PC to Mac. Microsoft has a perfectly good version of Office 365 for Mac that comes with Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Outlook, and more. If you've been thinking about switching away from the Office productivity suite, there are alternatives that offer many of the features you love in Microsoft's programs, plus some features you can't get anywhere else.

iWork Suite

Apple's alternative to Office is iWork. It's the most comparable alternative to Microsoft's productivity suite, only it comes free with every Mac. The interface is different, and will take some time to get used to, but if you're really interested in kicking Office to the curb, the iWork suite is the best alternative on Mac.

If you're ready for change, and Office's user interface, design, and tools aren't burned into your psyche, get Apple's iWork suite of apps. It comes preinstalled on new Macs, but you can also find it in the Mac App Store. /resume-wizard-microsoft-word-mac/.

• Pages - Download now
• Numbers- Download now
• Keynote - Download now

OpenOffice

OpenOffice by Apache is probably the most similar to Microsoft Office in look and design. It comes with a word processor, a spreadsheet maker, and a presentation creator, all with many of the same features their Office counterparts have. Files are saved as open document format files, so they can be opened with any document viewer, including Office apps, without needing to be converted first. The best part is that OpenOffice is completely free.

Microsoft Office Alternatives

If you're looking for an alternative to Microsoft Office that looks and works pretty much exactly the same, but doesn't cost a dime, OpenOffice is for you.

LibreOffice

LibreOffice is an open source productivity suite very similar to Microsoft Office that comes with a word processor, spreadsheet maker, and presentation creator. It also includes a vector graphics editor, a math formula editor, and a database manager. Files are saved as open document format files, so you can open them with any document viewer, including Office apps, without needing to be converted first, though it does provide tools for saving a document as an Office-specific file. LibreOffice is totally free. It is very similar in design to Microsoft Office, with some minor differences in the design.

LibreOffice is a solid replacement for the Office apps and includes some useful extra programs that Office doesn't even have.

Google Docs

Google Docs is the easiest replacement for Microsoft office because it's so accessible. If you have a Gmail account, or a Google Hangouts account, or a YouTube account, you have Google Docs. Just visit the web-based app from your browser and you can create word processor documents, spreadsheets, and presentations. There is a Google Drive app you can download onto Mac so you can work offline. The changes will be made when your Mac is back online. Google Docs doesn't look at all like Microsoft Office, and has a very different user interface, but it does have many of the same, familiar features you know from Office.

The thing that makes Google Docs so useful, however, is it's real-time collaboration, which works seamlessly with multiple users. I've worked alongside a dozen other people in one document. I am able to see where everyone is within the documents and can see exactly when changes are made.

If you're looking for a very easy to use Office replacement that is ideal for working with others in real-time, you'll be pleased with Google Docs.

What's your pick?

Do you use a Microsoft Office alternative you'd recommend to our readers that are new to Mac or just want to switch from Microsoft? Put your suggestion in the comments below and tell us why its the one you chose.

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