Following yesterday's leak of several screenshots from the next version of Microsoft's Outlook for Mac, Chinese site cnBeta now shares much more information [Google Translate] about the upcoming version of Microsoft's productivity suite for Mac.
The report shares several presentation slides outlining some of the features of the next Office for Mac, as well as a timeline showing a planned release sometime in the first half of 2015. Microsoft team members had previously suggested the suite would launch this year.
The slides point to four key focus areas for Microsoft during the development cycle of the next Office for Mac, including a modernized look with full Retina support to match the OS X aesthetic while still aligning the experience with Office for Windows, improved connectivity with cloud services including Office 365 and SkyDrive (OneDrive), significant improvements to Outlook, and the addition of OneNote, which appeared as a standalone release earlier this year.
(Click for larger)
Taking a quick look at some of the changes to the core Office apps, the slides address the addition of the Quick Access Toolbar from the Windows version throughout the upcoming Mac suite, improved organization of tools and formatting, new support for Excel 2013 functions, Threaded Comments and improved Presenter View for PowerPoint, and enhanced Reply Comments and "Expand and Collapse" paragraph view toggles in Word.
Microsoft Office for Mac has not seen a major update since late 2010, when Office for Mac 2011 was released as a comparable version of Office 2010 for Windows. But while Windows saw the release of Office 2013 early last year, no corresponding version of Office for Mac has yet been released. The next version of Office for Windows is similarly expected in the spring of next year.
Thursday November 6, 2025 11:12 am PST by Joe Rossignol
Apple today updated its trade-in values for select iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple Watch models. Trade-ins can be completed on Apple's website, or at an Apple Store.
The charts below provide an overview of Apple's current and previous trade-in values in the U.S., according to its website. Maximum values for most devices either decreased or saw no change, but the iPad Air received a slight bump.
...
Thursday November 6, 2025 2:45 pm PST by Juli Clover
Apple is promoting the new Liquid Glass design in iOS 26, showing off the ways that third-party developers are embracing the aesthetic in their apps. On its developer website, Apple is featuring a visual gallery that demonstrates how "teams of all sizes" are creating Liquid Glass experiences.
The gallery features examples of Liquid Glass in apps for iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, and Mac. Apple...
Friday November 7, 2025 6:40 am PST by Joe Rossignol
Apple's online store in the U.S. is suddenly offering a pack of four AirTags for just $29, which is the same price as a single AirTag.
This is likely a pricing error, and it is unclear if orders will be fulfilled. Apple has not discounted the AirTag four-pack in any other countries that we checked.
Delivery estimates are already pushing into late November to early December, suggesting...
Thursday November 6, 2025 4:08 pm PST by Juli Clover
IKEA today announced the upcoming launch of 21 new Matter-compatible smart home products that will be able to interface with HomeKit and the Apple Home app. There are sensors, lights, and control options, all of which will be reasonably priced. Some of the products are new, while some are updates to existing lines that IKEA previously offered.
There are a series of new smart bulbs that are...
Monday November 3, 2025 5:54 am PST by Joe Rossignol
Following more than a month of beta testing, Apple released iOS 26.1 on Monday, November 3. The update includes a handful of new features and changes, including the ability to adjust the look of Liquid Glass and more.
Below, we outline iOS 26.1's key new features.
Liquid Glass Toggle
iOS 26.1 lets you choose your preferred look for Liquid Glass.
In the Settings app, under Display...
We're officially in the month of Black Friday, which will take place on Friday, November 28 in 2025. As always, this will be the best time of the year to shop for great deals, including popular Apple products like AirPods, iPad, Apple Watch, and more. In this article, the majority of the discounts will be found on Amazon.
Note: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with some of these vendors. When ...
Friday November 7, 2025 1:19 pm PST by Juli Clover
HTX Studio this week shared the results from a six-month battery test that compared how fast charging and slow charging can affect battery life over time.
Using six iPhone 12 models, the channel set up a system to drain the batteries from five percent and charge them to 100 percent over and over again. Three were fast charged, and three were slow charged.
Another set of iPhones underwent...
The future of Apple Fitness+ is "under review" amid a reorganization of the service, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman.
In the latest edition of his "Power On" newsletter, Gurman said that Apple Fitness+ remains one of the company's "weakest digital offerings." The service apparently suffers from high churn and little revenue.
Nevertheless, Fitness+ has a small, loyal fanbase that...
Thursday November 6, 2025 4:37 am PST by Tim Hardwick
Apple in iOS 26.2 will disable automatic Wi-Fi network syncing between iPhone and Apple Watch in the European Union to comply with the bloc's regulations, suggests a new report.
Normally, when an iPhone connects to a new Wi-Fi network, it automatically shares the network credentials with the paired Apple Watch. This allows the watch to connect to the same network independently – for...
About damn time. Office for Mac was really getting long in the tooth. Unfortunately, no matter how much I love Pages, I just can't rely on it exclusively, because I can never ever be sure that if I finish something in Pages and export it to doc it will look like exactly the same in MS Word... and yeah, there are documents that you are kind of obliged to send in .doc (not in PDF), that is the sad truth... :(
As a Seattleite, I know one of the Microsoft Office for Mac team members. I get the impression that they are Apple devotees, working within Microsoft to bring out the best version of Office for OSX and iOS. Although Office for iPad is not perfect, it's pretty damn good, and it's definitely more an iOS8 app than a "Microsoft app running on an iPad." I expect the same from this team's next version of Office for OSX. Let's cut them some slack, guys, and give them time to do it right.
I just want it to work right. i.e.: work like the Windows version of Office. It doesn't have to look the same. Just work the same.
We have users that move from Windows to OS X. They like Mac OS X, they HATE Office for Mac.
Same with me. I spend most of the day in OS X. It does everything I want it to - except run the real Office. I have to load up a virtual machine or boot into Windows just to run Office.
Office for Mac has been Office in name, only so far.
"Outlook 2011" is just a misnomer for Entourage 14.0. And of course, every version of Entourage/Outlook for Mac never works like the previous version. 2011 doesn't look or work like 2008. 2008 doesn't look or work like 2004. Fonts work differently. Labels and colors work differently. Rules work differently. Nothing is consistent with "Office".
This can't come soon enough! I need Office for work, and this looks like Mac users will finally get what they deserve: a first class Office on Mac.
I'm probably in the minority here, but I think Microsoft is slowly turning in the right direction under Satya Nadella. It's a big ship and there's a lot of Ballmer to undo, but I am hopeful.
I'm very happy to see more concrete evidence of an update! On a side note, did anyone else chuckle when they saw the "support for new Office 2013 features and capabilities."? I guess "new" is completely in the eyes of the beholder....
