Microsoft has confirmed the previously leaked internal document that show a Sept. 22 release for Office 2016.
"You may have heard the rumors, but today I'm happy to confirm that Office 2016 will be broadly available starting on September 22nd," Julia White, general manager of Office 365 Technical Product Management, said in a blog post. "If you have a volume licensing agreement in place, you can download Office 2016 from the Volume Licensing Service Center starting October 1st," she added.
The new features being introduced to Office 2016 include monthly updates through Office 365. For business users, the updates will arrive in bulk every four months. Both regular and business consumers, however, will receive monthly security patches.
Office 2016 will include the integration of several methods for real time collaboration and the introduction of the new color themes. This last was taken from the free Office app developed for mobile devices. Users will also be able to use the new "Tell Me" feature, which allows them to navigate or access menu items easily.
All in all, Office 2016 is not radically different from its previous iteration, according to PC World. This issue, of course, still remains to be confirmed as users await the official Office suite roll out in the latter part of the month. For users who cannot wait to try the new version for themselves, there is an available preview version, as HNGN previously reported. It can be downloaded through this link.
Microsoft has yet to announce the price of Office 2016 as a standalone product. If you are an Office 365 subscriber, however, your base payment of $70 annually will include free updates to the new productivity suite.
