The most of basic but useful of shortcuts within Word can be found in this section. Save your work, close it out safely, or even print a file; we’ve got you covered.
Microsoft Office is one of the most frequently used application suites across the globe. It has been a business staple for decades and is also frequently used in homes and schools. Many Windows users who consider switching to the Mac often cite the need for Office among their biggest hesitations or concerns about making the switch. While a Mac version of Office has been around as long as Office itself, it’s a costly prospect for many consumers, and the Mac version often lags behind the release cycle of the Windows version. Add to that the fact that an Intel-native version of Office has yet to be released, and it becomes clear why alternative products are something worth exploring for any Mac user—especially when there are some great alternatives available. IWork One of the first alternatives that spring to mind for many people is Apple’s, perhaps because a trial version is included with every Mac (along with a demo version of Microsoft Office). IWork consists of a word processing tool called Pages and a presentation tool called Keynote (Apple is rumored to be developing a spreadsheet tool to be included with the next release of iWork).
While Pages can technically be called a word processing application, it’s actually a combination word processor and layout tool. For consumers and small organizations, it can function as both an alternative to Word and as a low-cost alternative to the basic features of InDesign or Quark. Pages, which features an interface that’s similar to iWeb’s interface, lets users easily add pictures via the iLife Media Browser, develop charts, create pages of text or text boxes, insert tables and columns, and make use of a variety of formatting tools. Like iWeb, it features an Inspector palette that can be used to apply all manner of effects to included text, shapes, charts, tables, and images—making it easy to create visually stunning documents quickly and easily. Pages supports importing from and exporting to Word format, although it cannot directly open or save Word documents. Imported documents do maintain Word formatting and styles and if a document is created from a Word template, all style information will be retained.
Pages does have a user interface that is a complete departure from that of any office suite. Combined with the fact that it works much like a layout tool, this can make transitioning between Pages and Word a bit of a challenge. Also, it doesn’t offer support for many of Word’s advanced features. Keynote is, in some ways, more impressive than PowerPoint.
It offers a wide variety of templates and transitions that are visually stunning. Like Pages, it offers access to photos and other digital media via the iLife Media Browser and offers a wide range of effects that can be easily rendered to any slide elements. Keynote’s user interface includes many elements similar to iWeb and Pages (including the Inspector). However, its interface remains more standard than that of Pages. Unfortunately, while Keynote is an amazing tool, it offers no compatibility with PowerPoint or other Office file formats—meaning that to play a presentation requires Keynote (although presentations can be exported as QuickTime video files).
Everyone needs a great word processor, and Microsoft Word is one of the best thanks to its wide format support, integration with other Office apps and huge range of high-quality templates. However, that power and convenience doesn’t come cheap, even with the Microsoft Office 365 subscription model, which spreads the cost throughout the year.
Thankfully, free word processing software has come a long way in recent years, and there are some great alternatives to Word that don’t cost a penny. Lightweight distraction-free writing software has its place, but here we’re looking for fully-featured word processors with support for templates, advanced formatting, and compatibility with Microsoft file formats. You could switch to any of these programs today and begin working immediately.
We update this guide regularly, so you know you're always getting the most accurate information about the best software available right now. Excellent file format support 's word processing component, Writer, has a slick design very similar to the current version of Microsoft Word. It features a ribbon interface and almost identical icons. If you like using Office 2007 or later, the move will be pretty much seamless.
There's tabbed browsing for multiple documents (a feature not found in Word, but one we love), and WPS Office Writer can open pretty much any text document format you can throw at it. It has its own proprietary file format (WPS), but new documents default to Microsoft’s DOCX format for convenient sharing with Word users. WPS Writer includes built-in cloud support with 1GB free storage (comparable to Microsoft OneDrive) for easy backup and syncing. There are also free mobile apps for Android and iOS that are fully compatible with Microsoft file formats, and let you edit and sync documents on the move. WPS Office Writer comes with a good range of templates pre-installed, with more available to download. Unlike LibreOffice and OpenOffice (below), WPS Office isn’t open source. Instead, it’s supported by ads, but these are unobtrusive and won't stop you getting on with some serious work.
There’s that removes the ads and throws in bonus PDF tools, but the free edition is superb. Give it a try – we're pretty sure you'll be impressed. Excellent file format support If you feel most comfortable using the older, pre-ribbon versions of Microsoft Word, you’ll love Writer. Its interface is very similar to Word prior to the controversial introduction of the Ribbon in 2007, so if you’re familiar with the older interface, you’ll be up and running in seconds. It'll take a little longer if you're only used to newer versions of Microsoft Office, but the menus and icons are simple and intuitive, so don't be put off.
LibreOffice Writer is fully compatible with Microsoft Word documents (including DOC and DOCX) as well as other common text file formats, so you’ll have no trouble sharing files with friends or colleagues using different software, or opening your old files. Writer also integrates seamlessly with the other tools in the LibreOffice suite, so you can easily import a spreadsheet from Calc, or a graph from Charts – just like you could in Word.
What sets LibreOffice Writer apart from other free Microsoft Word alternatives is its lively community of users and developers, who have created for you to download and use. LibreOffice itself receives regular updates too, adding features and security that help it keep pace with Microsoft Word.
The only thing lacking is integrated cloud support, but you can easily sync your files using Dropbox or, so this is a minor drawback. Relatively infrequent updates LibreOffice is a fork of and the two share the same code base, so it’s no surprise that there’s little to choose between the two. Both offer excellent compatibility with Microsoft Word documents, and work seamlessly with their linked spreadsheet, database, and presentation applications. There’s almost no difference between the programs’ features or interfaces, either – both use a classic Microsoft Office style system, with a handy sidebar for formatting options. OpenOffice provides fewer templates than LibreOffice by default, but, so this isn't a concern. The main difference is that OpenOffice only receives one or two updates a year, whereas LibreOffice is updated every couple of months thanks to its larger team of volunteer developers.
This means that reported bugs and vulnerabilities are likely to be fixed sooner in LibreOffice, and new features are added sooner. Can't save in DOCX format TextMaker's interface is less cluttered than most free Microsoft Word alternatives, but it doesn't skimp on tools and settings. Some features are tucked away in sub-menus, but you can customize the toolbars by adding, removing and rearranging the icons (you can find more by clicking the small arrow buttons on the right).
All the essentials are there, and FreeOffice TextMaker makes it particularly easy to create interactive documents with fields and bookmarks, which you can then save as PDFs. The selection of templates isn’t huge, but they look good and will satisfy most of your needs. The drawback of TextMaker is its inability to save your work in Microsoft’s DOCX format. This is a shame, because this newer format has several advantages over DOC, including more consistent appearance in different word processing programs and superior file compression.
You can open files in DOCX format using FreeOffice TextMaker, so you won't be locked out of your existing documents, but if your friends and family use Word, you might prefer one of the alternatives listed above. Adds DOCX support for a one-off fee of £48.20 (about US$60, AU$75). Importing documents is tricky If you've plunged into the Google ecosystem, you're probably already familiar with its Microsoft Word analog,. Opening existing documents can be a bit of a hassle – you need to upload them to Google Drive before you can start editing them in Docs. Although there's good file format support, imported Word documents might look very different if they use formatting and features not supported by Docs, or rely on locally stored fonts. That said, formatting isn't the main purpose of Google Docs – collaboration is. Provided they have a Google account, it's easy to invite colleagues, friends and family to work together on the same document simultaneously.
If several people are working on the document at once, different colored cursors will appear on the page to indicate where they're working. If that sounds like chaos, you can also restrict editing and just allow collaborators to make comments, which you can implement or ignore. If you're not a fan of Google products, you can also take a look at, which works in much the same way, but with better support for DOC and DOCX files – all synced to OneDrive. Need more than just Word?