The Microsoft Office Suite will now be offered free to all mobile users, the company announced Thursday.
The company said in a statement posted on its official blog that the move came after its March announcement offering the Microsoft Office to iPad users.
Microsoft said the major move has sparked over 40 million downloads in App Store and gained favorable feedback from users. Their appreciation, it said, has urged them to do even more, pushing them to release native apps for OneNote, Lync, Yammer, OneDrive for Business and OWA for iOS and Android. Aside from these, Outlook for Mac and the Office for Mac beta are also underway and are set to be released next year.
To make the software available to almost all mobile phones, it will now push the Office for Android tablet Preview and the Word, Excel, and PowerPoint apps for iPhones. The Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint apps for iPads will also be updated. These moves, it noted, will assure "consistently beautiful and productive Office experience on every device."
"Today we're taking the next major step to bring Office to everyone, on every device, and I'm excited to announce that Office apps customers love are coming to Android tablets with the start of our Office for Android tablet Preview. We're also delivering Word, Excel, and PowerPoint apps for iPhone and updates for the iPad apps," Microsoft's Corporate Vice President John Case said in the statement.
"Our vision of Office everywhere wouldn't be complete without Windows, so I'm pleased to confirm that new, touch-optimized Office apps for Windows 10 are in the works and we'll have more to share soon," he added.
"With Office on nearly every device, it's incredibly important to us that customers have a consistent experience and the ability to do more-anywhere and everywhere. So, starting today, people can create and edit Office content on iPhones, iPads, and soon, Android tablets using Office apps without an Office 365 subscription," he said.
Case however said that Office 365 subscribers need not to worry as they will still have the benefits of having the software but with a much more advanced editing and capabilities. Other benefits such as their unlimited OneDrive storage and Dropbox integration will still be there, he added.
According to The New York Times, the Office Suite, which was first released in 1990, represents almost a third or about $26 billion of the total $87 billion of Microsoft's previous fiscal year revenue.
The Microsoft Word, Excel, and Powerpoint for iPhone and iPad are all available on iTunes. iPad and iPhone users can download the Microsoft Word here, Microsoft Excel here, and Microsoft Powerpoint here.
As for Android tablet users, you can check out and sign up for the Preview here. The Office Suite will be available for Android in 2015.