Microsoft makes Office Mobile free; sign up for the Office for Android tablets preview

Microsoft has just announced some major moves for their mobile Office efforts. Much of today’s news concerned folks on the iOS front, though Android users were thrown a pretty decent bone, as well. The company is now accepting sign-ups to specifically test Microsoft Office for Android Tablets. The signup form notes a couple of prerequisites:

• You must have an Android tablet running KitKat
• Your tablet must be between 7.0 and 10.1 inches
• You can not be on Android 5.0 Lollipop
• You will need to avoid any system updates coming to your device after you have been accepted to preview Office

Those are some very stringent requirements, but it is a preview and we expect Microsoft to be able to reach as many people on Android as they can once the final product is finally available.

So what’s on tap when you’re finally accepted? Well, it looks like Microsoft wants to place a bigger emphasis on making user interfaces that look and feel more native to the platform they’re on. The iPhone and iPad apps have gotten such love today. Oh, and it’s now free to create, edit and view documents on the mobile apps without the need of a Microsoft Office 365 subscription. That functionality previously required you to pay for one of Microsoft’s monthly plans, but thankfully that is no longer the case.

You will still need to pay for advanced features like cloud collaboration and unlimited OneDrive storage, but it’s nice to get the base experience without having to pay an extra dime. You can head to Microsoft’s sign-up form if you meet the prerequisites and are interested in testing this out. Otherwise, we’ll have a little while yet before we can indulge in the goodness announced today.

[via Microsoft]