LibreOffice - Fast intuitive and free
Overall Satisfaction with LibreOffice
I have used LibreOffice since 2012 for a client company that sought a free, open-source alternative to Microsoft Office. This company was reorganizing itself after emerging from bankruptcy and needed a low-cost, quality, easy-to-use office suite of applications that rivaled Microsoft Office. I installed LibreOffice for all users, and they never looked back. I previously gave this suite, primarily Writer and Calc, an 8 out of 10 in a review, but my client is now using version 25.2.7.2, and I keep myself quite fluent in the suite to answer user questions, and I’ve revised my rating to a 9 out of 10 due to the continuous improvements. The main business problems this suite addresses are cost-containment, compatibility, and ease of use for nearly 100 users who would not be considered computer savvy by any stretch of the imagination. Occasionally, new hires initially grumble, but within a very short time of using LibreOffice, they generally settle in and find they love it. And, with each new version, it gets more user-friendly, and the user support required gets less and less. A win-win!
Pros
- Tools like speeling, grammar, and thesaurus are super fast and intuitive
- Read-only content can be created by adding a section and password
- The right-click menus are very intuitive and change on the fly with what is needed depending on the content and situation
- Documents can be saved natively as *.docx or *.xlsx
Cons
- I would like to see more templates such as ones for forms
- I would like to see a free-form character/text rotation
- LibreOffice is free, open source software, so there is no cost, and it does that without sacrificing much, if anything.
- For businesses starting up, or those in very competitive markets, or with extremely tight margins, LibreOffice is the way to go.
Except for collaboration, which I seldom need, I find that LibreOffice beats all of the other similar products I have used in features, functionality, and intuitiveness. The user interface on the LibreOffice applications seems cleaner, and the right-click menus are more intuitive, with much better auto-adapting what is presented based on content and situation.
Do you think LibreOffice delivers good value for the price?
Yes
Are you happy with LibreOffice's feature set?
Yes
Did LibreOffice live up to sales and marketing promises?
Yes
Did implementation of LibreOffice go as expected?
Yes
Would you buy LibreOffice again?
Yes

Comments
Please log in to join the conversation