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Feature Comparison of Office Desktop Apps vs. Office on the Web Apps

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This is an updated version of the article I wrote on September 8, 2017 titled Limitations of Office Online Applications.


Microsoft Office 365 supports both the desktop versions of Microsoft Office applications, which are installed on a workstation, and the online versions of Office applications that can be opened, viewed, and edited in a web browser. However, there are many differences between the two versions and this article documents some of the major differences.

When I wrote the aforementioned article on September 8, 2017, Microsoft used the name “Office Online apps” to refer to the browser-based versions of Office apps (e.g. Word Online, Excel Online, etc.). In July 2019, Microsoft dropped the name “Online” and switched to the name “Office web apps“, as reported by Engadget on July 24, 2019. Therefore, that’s the terminology I will use in this article.

The Office on the web versions are not offered as a replacement for the full-featured desktop Office applications, they are only offered so users can quickly read an Office document online, or make some minor changes to the application because most of the features in the desktop versions are not supported in the Office on the web version. The Office on the web apps in Office 365 can definitely come handy, but as you will discover after reading this article, there are just too many limitations in Office on the web apps that prevent a vast majority of organizations from using them as a replacement for desktop apps, which are full-featured applications with all the bells and whistles.

Best Practice: Don’t work on the same document in both Office desktop app and Office on the web app to avoid data corruption and other support issues. Pick one version and stick with it. The Office desktop version is the recommended choice.

The Office on the web apps may work for an individual at home, but it’s hard to find a business that is exclusively using Office Online apps because it’s just not practical. Use the following information to find out which features are missing from the Office on the web apps in Office 365. If you don’t see a feature that’s available in an Office Desktop app listed here, chances are that it would work in the Office on the web app. In other words, this is a list of features that are NOT AVAILABLE in Office Online. The primary source of information for this article is Office for the web  Service Description and is provided here for future reference. This can be useful to readers because with each new version of the product, Microsoft replaces old content with the new version without any redirection of pages.

NOTE: The following lists were last updated on 7/31/2019. These are not complete lists, but they give you a good idea of which desktop app features are available in Office for the web. For complete, accurate, and updated lists of application features visit Microsoft. You will find additional details on Microsoft’s website that are not included here.

Word

Application features Word for the web Word desktop app
Alignment guides and live layout No Yes
Apply styles Yes Yes
Autosave Yes Yes
Autotext Yes Yes
Browse and start from professionally designed templates Yes Yes
Bullets and numbering Yes Yes
Captions No Yes
Citations and bibliography No Yes
Clipboard Yes Yes
Collaboration- advanced No Yes
Content controls Yes Yes
Cover pages No Yes
Creation of advanced document elements No Yes
Document parts and themes No Yes
Dropbox Yes Yes
Equations No Yes
Find and Replace Yes Yes
Font formatting Yes Yes
Footnotes and endnotes Yes Yes
Full fidelity reading view Yes Yes
Graphic effect presets Yes Yes
Headers and footers Yes Yes
Hyperlinks Yes Yes
Index No1 Yes
Ink Editor No Yes
Insert online pictures Yes Yes
IRM and password-protection No Yes
Learning Tools No Yes
Lists Yes Yes
Mail merge No Yes
Office Add-ins Yes Yes
Offline viewing and authoring No Yes
Page breaks Yes Yes
Page layout tools Yes Yes
Page layout tools- advanced No Yes
Page numbers Yes Yes
Paragraph formatting Yes Yes
Picture tools Yes Yes
Preformatted font and color schemes Yes Yes
Present online No Yes
Print to PDF Yes Yes
Printing- advanced No Yes
Proofing tools Yes Yes
Proofing tools- advanced No Yes
Real-time co-authoring Yes Yes
Reference tools No Yes
Rendering of text boxes/shapes Yes Yes
Researcher No Yes
Rich media No Yes
Rich table formatting Yes Yes
Save As and Download a copy Yes Yes
Save as PDF Yes Yes
Share Yes Yes
Simple table creation Yes Yes
SmartArt No Yes
Table of Authority No Yes
Table of Contents No Yes
Tap No Yes
Tell Me Yes Yes
Translation service Yes Yes
Undo and Redo Yes Yes
VBA and Forms scripts No Yes
View and add comments Yes Yes
Watermarks No Yes
Word count Yes Yes
Zoom Yes Yes

Excel

Application features Excel for the web Excel desktop app
Accessibility Checker Yes Yes
Add background color to sheet tabs Yes Yes
Add hyperlinks Yes Yes
Advanced time filtering (Timeline slicer) No Yes
Alignment Yes Yes
Apply conditional formatting Yes Yes
Apply smart/recommended formatting No Yes
Audio notes recording No Yes
Autocomplete Yes Yes
AutoSum Yes Yes
Calculations Yes Yes
Cell references in formulas Yes Yes
Comment creation Yes Yes
Copy and paste Yes Yes
Create external data connections No Yes
Create tables Yes Yes
Creation of advanced analysis views (Power View, Power Pivot, Slicers) No Yes
Data validation Yes Yes
Drag and drop cells Yes Yes
Dropbox Yes Yes
Duplicate (copy) workseets Yes Yes
Embed Workbook on Web or Blog Page (OneDrive) Yes No
External references No Yes
Fill Handle Yes Yes
Find Yes Yes
Font and cell formatting Yes Yes
Formula bar Yes Yes
Formula tools- advanced No Yes
Freeze panes Yes Yes
Full fidelity reading view Yes Yes
Functions Yes Yes
GoTo Yes Yes
Group data Yes Yes
Hide/unhide rows, columns, and sheets Yes Yes
Insert charts Yes Yes
Insert/delete rows and columns Yes Yes
Insert pictures Yes Yes
Insert shapes Yes Yes
Merge cells Yes Yes
Named ranges Yes Yes
Number formatting Yes Yes
Office Add-ins Yes Yes
Offline viewing and authoring No Yes
PivotCharts Yes Yes
PivotTables Yes Yes
Post to Social network and present online No Yes
Power Pivot viewing Yes Yes
Power View viewing Yes Yes
Print Yes Yes
Real-time co-authoring Yes Yes
Recommended chart creation and editing with formatting controls No Yes
Refresh existing data connections Yes Yes
Remove duplicate values Yes Yes
Rename and add sheets Yes Yes
Rename file while workbook is open Yes No
Replace Yes Yes
Rights Management: IRM and password security No Yes
Save or Download a copy Yes Yes
Share Yes Yes
Sheet protection Yes Yes
Slicer viewing Yes Yes
Sort and filter data Yes Yes
Spreadsheet audit and compliance No Yes
Status bar aggregates Yes Yes
Surveys Yes No
Tell Me Yes Yes
Text formatting Yes Yes
Total data Yes Yes
Undo and redo Yes Yes
VBA and macro scripting Yes Yes
View 3D charts Yes Yes
What if analysis tools No Yes

PowerPoint

Application features PowerPoint for the web PowerPoint desktop app
Alignment, bullets, numbers Yes Yes
Apply basic transitions and animations Yes1 Yes
Apply rich formatting to text, shapes, and pictures No Yes
Apply themes and theme variants Yes Yes
Arrange objects Yes Yes
Broadcast slide show No Yes
Clipboard Yes Yes
Create and manage slides Yes Yes
Create custom animation No1 Yes
Design tools- advanced No Yes
Embed presentation on web or blog page Yes No
Font formatting Yes Yes
Full fidelity reading view Yes Yes
Full ink support No Yes
Full selection of animations and transitions No1 Yes
Headers and footers No Yes
Hyperlinks Yes Yes
Insert online video Yes Yes
Integration with Excel for charts No Yes
Navigation— slide sorter Yes Yes
Office Add-ins Yes Yes
Offline viewing and authoring No Yes
Picture cropping Yes Yes
Pictures Yes Yes
Presenter view No Yes
Present online through Skype for Business or the Office Presentation Service Yes Yes
Print to PDF Yes Yes
Proofing tools Yes Yes
Real-time co-authoring Yes Yes
Reviewer tools – advanced No Yes
Rights Management: IRM and password security No Yes
Run slide show Yes Yes
Save As or Download a copy Yes Yes
Shapes Yes Yes
Share Yes Yes
Slide show Yes Yes
SmartArt Yes Yes
Table creation/editing and formatting Yes Yes
Tell Me Yes Yes
Undo and redo Yes Yes
View and add comments Yes Yes
View and edit slide notes Yes Yes
WYSIWYG viewing Yes Yes

OneNote

Application features OneNote for the web OneNote desktop app
Advanced collaboration: New content shows as unread, presence No Yes
Apply tags Yes Yes
Bullets and numbering Yes Yes
Clipboard Yes Yes
Clipping experiences No Yes
Co-authoring Yes Yes
Create and manage pages and sections Yes Yes
Download copy of embedded Office files Yes Yes
Drag and Drop Pages Yes Yes
Drag and Drop Sections Yes Yes
Drag and Drop Section Groups No Yes
Dropbox Yes Yes
Edit embedded files No Yes
Equations Yes Yes
Hyperlinks Yes Yes
Image optical character recognition (OCR) No Yes
Inking: ink-to-text and math, customizable pens, drawing tools No Yes
Ink viewing Yes Yes
Navigation Yes Yes
Notebook management: Cross section/notebook page filing, section re-order, create/delete section groups Yes Yes
Office Add-ins Yes Yes
Outlook integration (tasks) No Yes
Paragraph formatting Yes Yes
Pictures Yes Yes
Print Yes Yes
Proofing tools Yes Yes
Rights Management: IRM and password security No Yes
Search by: tag, title, author/date, audio notes Yes Yes
Search (on page, within sections) Yes Yes
Share Yes Yes
Show or hide authors Yes Yes
Styles Yes Yes
Tables Yes Yes
Template support No Yes
Undo and Redo Yes Yes
Video playback No Yes
View previous page versions Yes Yes

You can download Microsoft’s 621-page PDF that contains the above lists plus lots of additional details. The live, updated version of the PDF document can be downloaded here.

Thanks for reading my article. If you are interested in IT training & consulting services, please reach out to me. Visit ZubairAlexander.com for information on my professional background.

Copyright © 2019 SeattlePro Enterprises, LLC. All rights reserved.

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2 Comments

  1. You only mentioned embed as the only disabled feature on desktop but there are many more, main one and most important the xlookup function in Excel which you can find on the web version but not on desktop. In summary, it’s a mess from Microsoft.

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