Microsoft Office Support Lifecycle Explained
Microsoft Office is a widely used product suite which includes tools like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Project, Publisher, Access, and OneNote.
It has been around since 1988 and has gone through many versions, each of which has a specific support cycle with defined dates. All versions of Microsoft Office products before Microsoft Office 2019 are eligible for ten years of support following their release, during which Microsoft releases updates for the product. The ten-year period is divided into two five-year phases:
- Mainstream phase where Microsoft may provide product feature updates, technical support and security updates; and
- Extended phase where no new features updates or technical support is provided, only security updates.
As mentioned a bit earlier, Office 2019 reduced the Extended Support phase from five years to two years.
So here is a summary of the different Microsoft Office versions support state:
| Version | Mainstream Support End | Extended Support End |
| Office 2007 | October 10, 2017 | October 13, 2020 |
| Office 2010 | October 10, 2017 | October 13, 2020 |
| Office 2013 | April 10, 2018 | April 11, 2023 |
| Office 2016 | October 13, 2020 | October 14, 2025 |
| Office 2019 | October 10, 2023 | October 14,2025 |
Office 365 ProPlus, which is a version of Office that’s available through Office 365, a subscription based service, is an evergreen product just like Windows 10. It is updated regularly, as often as monthly, with new features. Offfice ProPlus is supported in Windows 8.1, Windows 10, Windows Server 2016 and later.
More info at: Microsoft’s Product Lifecycle Site
