Microsoft Office 365: Difference between revisions

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'''[[wikipedia:Microsoft_365|Microsoft 365]]''' is a family of software, including Microsoft Word, Microsoft PowerPoint, and Microsoft Excel. The branding '''Office 365''' was introduced in 2010 to refer to its subscription-based [[software as a service]], including hosted services such as Office on the web.

== How to avoid Price Increase (At least for Microsoft 365 Personal Subscriptions) ==

==How to avoid Price Increase (At least for Microsoft 365 Personal Subscriptions)==

[[File:Screenshot 2025-04-05 205541.jpg|thumb|Cancel Microsoft 365 Personal Screenshot, showing the cheaper subscription plan]]

If you currently have a "Microsoft 365 Personal" subscription, and don't want to pay the $30 price increase, there is a way to "revert" back to the $69.99 subscription. Sign in to your Microsoft account, and go to your current subscriptions. Click on your "Microsoft 365 Personal" subscription, then click on cancel subscription. It will then give you the option to switch to the "Microsoft 365 Personal Classic" subscription (see image to right for reference), which is Microsoft's new name for what was the "Microsoft 365 Personal" subscription. There is a [https://www.reddit.com/r/microsoft/comments/1i7jrek/microsoft_365_personal_goes_up_in_price_by_30/ reddit thread] on how to do this, which is linked if you want to read through it as well.

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===Forced upsell===

In January 2025, YouTuber Atomic Shrimp reported<ref>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eYVPThx7yss</ref> that Microsoft had enacted a "forced upsell" of 365's new AI Copilot feature. Users with basic accounts (now called "Classic"), such as Shrimp himself, had been informed their subscription fee was going up, but that they would enjoy new features as a result, including Copilot. In his efforts to disable Copilot, Shrimp subsequently discovered that Microsoft now offered "Classic" plans, identical to the old basic plans both in features and in subscription fee. The option to downgrade to Classic, however, was only visible to enterprise users, not to personal users. In essence Microsoft upgraded users' plans without their consent and disabled the option to downgrade, forcing the user to contact Microsoft support in order to opt out of the newly introduced Copilot AI features. The forceful upgrade was at the user's expense, and the downgrading process through support, according to Shrimp, was very time consuming. It is possible to downgrade a personal account through the website without contacting support. If you go to the first page of the cancellation process, there should be an option to downgrade to the "Classic" plan.

File request, a common feature in other cloud service providers' ''free'' plans, that allows you to invite users to anonymously upload files to a designated cloud folder (e.g. group vacation photos) is only available in personal plans if every uploader is logged-in to a Microsoft account. If you want anonymous uploads, you have to upgrade to a One Drive for Business-Account. Since this is a common feature in other providers' free private plans (e.g. Dropbox), consumers subconsciously expect it to be a feature in paid personal OneDrive plans of the highest tier, but it's not offered.

===Obfuscation of local saving in favor of OneDrive (Word, PowerPoint, Excel)===

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 '''[[wikipedia:Microsoft_365|Microsoft 365]]''' is a family of software, including Microsoft Word, Microsoft PowerPoint, and Microsoft Excel. The branding '''Office 365''' was introduced in 2010 to refer to its subscription-based [[software as a service]], including hosted services such as Office on the web.
-== How to avoid Price Increase (At least for Microsoft 365 Personal Subscriptions) ==
+==How to avoid Price Increase (At least for Microsoft 365 Personal Subscriptions)==
 [[File:Screenshot 2025-04-05 205541.jpg|thumb|Cancel Microsoft 365 Personal Screenshot, showing the cheaper subscription plan]]
 If you currently have a "Microsoft 365 Personal" subscription, and don't want to pay the $30 price increase, there is a way to "revert" back to the $69.99 subscription. Sign in to your Microsoft account, and go to your current subscriptions. Click on your "Microsoft 365 Personal" subscription, then click on cancel subscription. It will then give you the option to switch to the "Microsoft 365 Personal Classic" subscription (see image to right for reference), which is Microsoft's new name for what was the "Microsoft 365 Personal" subscription. There is a [https://www.reddit.com/r/microsoft/comments/1i7jrek/microsoft_365_personal_goes_up_in_price_by_30/ reddit thread] on how to do this, which is linked if you want to read through it as well.
@@ Line 20: / Line 20: @@
 ===Forced upsell===
 In January 2025, YouTuber Atomic Shrimp reported<ref>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eYVPThx7yss</ref> that Microsoft had enacted a "forced upsell" of 365's new AI Copilot feature. Users with basic accounts (now called "Classic"), such as Shrimp himself, had been informed their subscription fee was going up, but that they would enjoy new features as a result, including Copilot. In his efforts to disable Copilot, Shrimp subsequently discovered that Microsoft now offered "Classic" plans, identical to the old basic plans both in features and in subscription fee. The option to downgrade to Classic, however, was only visible to enterprise users, not to personal users. In essence Microsoft upgraded users' plans without their consent and disabled the option to downgrade, forcing the user to contact Microsoft support in order to opt out of the newly introduced Copilot AI features. The forceful upgrade was at the user's expense, and the downgrading process through support, according to Shrimp, was very time consuming. It is possible to downgrade a personal account through the website without contacting support. If you go to the first page of the cancellation process, there should be an option to downgrade to the "Classic" plan.
+File request, a common feature in other cloud service providers' ''free'' plans, that allows you to invite users to anonymously upload files to a designated cloud folder (e.g. group vacation photos) is only available in personal plans if every uploader is logged-in to a Microsoft account. If you want anonymous uploads, you have to upgrade to a One Drive for Business-Account. Since this is a common feature in other providers' free private plans (e.g. Dropbox), consumers subconsciously expect it to be a feature in paid personal OneDrive plans of the highest tier, but it's not offered.
 ===Obfuscation of local saving in favor of OneDrive (Word, PowerPoint, Excel)===