The Best Free and Cross-Platform Office Suite Available, Period

Because there is no need to get a license in order to use it, it has been helpful in giving friends and family members who aren't tech-savvy access to this software on their own computer to be able to work freely on their own projects. It has worked really well on all major operating systems and it is a breeze to help out when something is not going as well as planned, since one file will open exactly the same on any machine. There is even a portable version of the suite that makes it possible to execute the software directly from a USB stick, which was also handy more than once. In work settings where there is no budget to install paid software on all machines, LibreOffice really is a lifesaver. Even though it is free, it has all the necessary features to get the job done and that is why it consistently becomes the number one choice to use, especially on Linux systems and in companies with less than ideal budget.

Pros

LibreOffice has a complete suite of tools that includes a word processor, a spreadsheet application, tools for drawing and presentation as well as a database manager. The word processor integrates flawlessly with other components of the suite: you can easily enter mathematical formulae, insert tables from a spreadsheet or drawings as multimedia files. It can also export to PDF with great results any kind of document that's opened with it. Apart from PDF, it can also export to various other formats depending on the type of document (including PNG, SVG, HTML, EPUB, etc.). One other clear advantage of LibreOffice is that it is free (as in open source) and uses by default open formats, which makes it easy to use with different software that use the same file extensions. It's also quite lightweight and works even on older systems. Since it works on different operating systems including Windows, MacOS and Linux, it can be used in work environments with machines used for different purposes without any problem. There are many templates and extensions available to customize the experience and the way styles and paragraphs are handled makes more sense than with other alternatives: it is clear what result is obtained and changes are easy to apply to a whole document.

Cons

One has to be careful with the database manager as there are a number of cases of corrupted databases that have been reported. LibreOffice also tries its best to import files that use a format from other popular suites but sometimes, the formatting will not match exactly what is expected, especially with DOCX and XLXS files when special components such as macros are involved. Because it uses Java to be cross-platform, it can feel slower than other alternatives and it doesn't look as well integrated as native applications for that reason. It can be tedious to design flowcharts with LibreOffice Draw because aligning elements between each other and resizing them is not always as intuitive as it could be. Opening PPTX (PowerPoint) presentations with LibreOffice Impress sometimes causes notorious lags and display errors with multimedia files. There are non-obvious workarounds, but this can be an issue when receiving presentations that are designed for other pieces of software.

A free, safe and reliable office automation, a revelation.

For any entrepreneur, the costs of the programs are usually a limitation, as an independent worker it is vital for me to have advanced programs and high professional skills, in order to offer my clients a quality service, so I have achieved with LibreOffice, find a faithful ally to all the work I must do, from processing reports for a service request, to developing all the presentations that my clients require to know the capabilities of my work, it is thanks to LibreOffice that I have managed to save the money that other commercial options they ask for the same capabilities that I get with LibreOffice, at the cost of a donation to your project if it is to my liking, or I download it and later with the payments of my clients I can finance this wonderful experience.

Pros

One of the things I like most about LibreOffice, is that it allows you to use any of its programs just by downloading it, it's great to have free software available for your equipment, whatever your operating system, it's precisely that mobility and adaptability of your platform, which has led her to always include them in the list of programs that I must download once I format the computer. The saving of money is abysmal, you can install as many times as you want in as many teams as you like, and after so many years of constant work of its developers, it is possible to have versions adapted to the languages of your region. There are no limitations to use it, in addition you have everything that private office sells you completely free, you have word processor, calculations, presentations and much more, do not hesitate to use it today.

Cons

For iOS its interface has reached beautiful levels, and little by little they have brought that high quality feeling to their other platforms, that is why I can not negatively qualify any of its components because LibreOffice itself is a true revelation.

Use makes the expert

Pros

- For those who do not know, is the competence of Microsoft Office, open source and I can say with complete certainty that it is very good and can perform almost all the same, if we are casual non-advanced users.
- It is easy to install, intuitive and easy to use, it is multiplatform, it comes in different languages, it has a portable version that can be carried on a pendrive.
- Currently I use the version Version: 5.0.1.2 and although it is free, I do not have the freedom to update it in the pc of my work.
- A great advantage of LibreOffice package tools over your competition, is that I can export to PDF or HTML without installing anything additional, as it is included in your menu.
- It is important to familiarize yourself with the format in which the documents are stored as it can be confusing when sharing with another person, usually sent in .odt or in the case of Cal I send it .ods and if by chance they tell me that they can not open it, because what I do is recommend that you download LibreOffice before converting it.
- You can make tables, insert images, graphics, make macros, bring templates by default for trades, communications, cards, curriculum, all tools are compatible among themselves, from my point of view has greater variety in fonts.
- If you want to start in the world of free software, the first step is to install LibreOffice.

Cons

LibreOffice allows you to open a .doc, an .xls, but it is possible that something will move or something will be unraveled at the design level, the content will be there but something can be distorted.

Cal has its limitations in terms of macros, the number of columns, has few styles of graphics compared to Excel.

The documents in LibreOffice seem to be slower to open.

LibreOffice- essential for grad students

I've used LIbreOffice since its beginning in 2011 and prior to that I used OpenOffice. LibreOffice is, for me, a superior alternative to MS Word as I have no concerns about vendor lock-in.

Pros

LibreOffice is very intuitive because it is based on rather traditional menu structures that make it easy for users to find features. It offers most of the features that MS Word offers, and most of the time implements them in an easier to understand fashion. LibreOffice can import documents from MS Word and does so usually flawlessly.

To avoid compatibility problems with MS Word, I advise using .odt format to create and edit your documents and only convert to .docx when necessary to send a copy to someone who uses MS Word. This will avoid most corruption problems.

LibreOffice is available in portable format. You can run it from a USB flash drive on any computer. This was extremely convenient for me when travelling and doing research- I could use any convenient computer and run my own complement of portable-apps including LibreOffice.

LibreOffice appears to be very efficiently coded- check out the size of the installation code (around 200mb) compared to MS Office 2013 (nearly 800bm).

The Document Foundation, which supports the development of LibreOffice, is dedicated to open standards to avoid proprietary vendor lock-in. The software is free to download and use- this is essential for grad students working on a budget. Open source software helps ensure that people have access to excellent software tools irrespective of their capability to pay.

Cons

Sometimes it cannot import MS Word documents that have special formatting.
It's more difficult to find quick solutions to formatting complex documents. It appears that the majority of professional instructional materials focuses on using MS Word.

I have been using LibreOffice since 2010, and OpenOffice since 2003. Excellent.

Pros

LibreOffice forked from OpenOffice in 2010 and has since become the premier open source office suite.

It has many pros:
-- open source license and thus is free. Most importantly, it is created by a community of developers who believe good quality software should be available to everyone, not just those who can afford it. Most of the world's population cannot afford a license of MS Word, nor do they have access to the internet. Open source software ensures that disadvantaged populations have better access to good software. Additionally, the open standards used by LibreOffice ensure that user's data will remain accessible and not locked into a proprietary format from which it cannot be extracted.

- standard menu. LibreOffice has smartly chosen to continue using standard menus rather than "ribbon menus" which many people find confusing because they change based on the task being performed. Few studies have proven that ribbon menus offer any productivity advantage whatsoever.

- easy to use. All of the features of LibreOffice are quite easy to use and plenty of third-party documentation and tutorials exist online.

- rapid development. New versions of LibreOffice are released every six months.

- LibreOffice has plugins for use with Zotero, an open source reference manager. This makes it an indepsensibe tool for university students and researchers.

Cons

- because it is under rapid development, the "FRESH" releases of LibreOffice sometimes crash. The "STABLE" version is, well, more stable, but I've still had it crash or freeze on me, although its unusual and no more often than MS Word crashes.

- While LibreOffice can open and create MS Word documents, sometimes the formatting is not exactly the same.

Libre Office Review

One of the most important business problems that I have seen my company resolve by using Libre Office is that we are able to utilize Libre Office at the fullest capabilities and resolve customer tickets much faster; because before it was time consuming to copy the file from the server and paste them in my local PC and then open them via excel, but with Libre Office is FREE to use and downloading the application is simple and fast. I would recommend other users who have not used Libre Office to use it before purchasing other competitor Office applications such s MS office which is pricy.

Pros

Libre Office is free to use on any platform of PC, what I like about Libre Office is that it consist of the 4 major applications that MS Office would charge a fortune in this day in age; Libre Office has word, powerpoint, excel, and Access; In Libre Office the application naming is different they had it at Writer, Calc, Imporess, Base for data base; even though the naming of the application is different compared to MS office or Google Applications, Libre Office has the same features as you would for writing a document, making a powerpoint, creating excel sheets, and developing a database; same features but FREE. Libre Office makes it easy to use and there is no need to learn tutorials on how to use Libre Office because I have seen the same generic icons across other applications. I am using Libre Office in my day to day activities for work purposes as well as to open and view client docs and financials and etc. our systems team has installed Libre Office in our servers so we can easily open and view documents mostly excel docs.

Cons

I have not had any issues using Libre Office

libreoffice review

Pros

This document editing app is simply the best i have ever used. i came across this application as an alternative to the mainstream software when i decided to try Linux and since then i have never gone back. The software is lightweight, easy to use, feature rich, a plethora of helpful options and most of all, it is free.
Open source; this software as against the other popular options does not make its users wait a very long time for updates and the regular updates that comes to this software is as a result of how other people with software development knowledge can add features they thought are missing and on and on it goes until the software gets to the very top on the chart of document editing softwares.
Spell check integration; what makes writing fun on the libre office is not only the fonts and the many options that aids productivity but also the spell check integration and the uniqueness of this spell checker is the fact that it is not only limited to the writer app, it can be judiciously used in every of the softwares embedded in the libreoffice suite.
Cross platform support; finding out that libreoffice is not only limited to the linux operating system heightened my interest even more as having it on the windows platform and on macos means i can do away with the paid alternative i had been putting up with for years now.

Cons

is there something i don't like about this software? The answer is no, i love every bit of it as it handles all the task i throw at it as a writer.

reliable, powerful, essential

I'm a consultant with nonprofits and work with clients all over the world, most using Microsoft products. We've been able to work together, sharing files and editing each other's work, very easily. Sharing files is a substantial part of my work, so it's essential I have a reliable tool.

Pros

What I love about this software is that it's free and of high quality. It looks and feels like any word processing, slide show presentation or spreadsheet software, including Microsoft's office products. It does everything I want it to do in terms of producing documents, creating presentations and crunching numbers. I can open old files created in other programs relatively easily, and I can save my material as a Microsoft file, which my clients usually prefer.

Cons

The support documentation is lacking, and the support forums often aren't helpful to those of us who are not software programmers and coders. I'm an end-user and need help focused on someone that is simply using the software for everyday office tasks - but often, I cannot figure out how to find that help. Also, saving a file as a Microsoft file often affects the layout - not in a good way. There also seems to be some accessibility issues - I created files for a client who told me this, but she couldn't easily explain what the problem was.

LibreOffice is my go to word processing solution every time

I use LibreOffice in my business and for personal use, in fact I encourage my friends and family to install and use the program. It does everything MS Office does and more and is easy to use. In my opinion its the Best free alternative to MS Office and I don't miss a thing.

Pros

I"m always using LibreOffice on my desktop, its a suitable and free alternative for Microsoft Office. The things I love about LibreOffice is it ability to use plugins aka extensions that enhances its functionality. There are language and translation extensions, Dictionary extensions, Clip Arts extensions, Templates for calender, formating etc.

LibreOffice also has features which allow the user to export documents in multiple format e.g. PDF and even .doc plus its own format which is .odt LibreOffice also opens documents of other formats such as .doc, .xls. Basically anything from Microsoft Office

The Interface is very similar to that of Microsoft Office so in my opinion there is no learning curve. In fact I remember once working in Calc where I was plugging away and forgot I wasn't using Excel

I can do everything in LibreOffice that I would do in Microsoft Office and more and remember LibreOffice Is free

Through the use of an extension I can save documents in multiple formats

I can save my documents on Google Drive and this is a built in feature

LibreOffice takes much less space on my hard drive than that popular commercial word processing software

Cons

There is nothing about LibreOffice that I dislike

Best MS Office Alternative

Not only do you benefit from the initial cost of the program (as opposed to MS Office) you also benefit due to free updates. Sharing LibreOffice documents of all types with Microsoft users has proven to be flawless, with few or any very minor compatibility issues.

Pros

LibreOffice is a great alternative to costly Microsoft Office suite. It is compatible with Word, Excel, and PowerPoint documents and is completely free. It utilizes a standard toolbar as opposed to the "ribbon" used by current Microsoft products, which may make it easier for some users to adapt. In addition, the Linux version of LibreOffice is the finest office suite available for Linux users. Ability to export files to .pdf format is a big plus.

Cons

While the default file formats are fine, if you are sharing documents with Microsoft users you will need to either use the "save as" option to change the default format, or change the program's defaults to those of Microsoft products, i.e. .doc, .docx, .xls, .xlsx, etc. Also, the product does not contain any built in clip-art, but such clip-art is readily available elsewhere.

Your best option in an open source office suite

When you need to import or export data tables with geographic attributes, they are required to be in specific formats, so that they can be used in Geographic Information Systems, such as the .csv format. Since the release of Microsofts 2007 suite, those formats were no longer present. Therefore the use of LibreOffice, allowed to fulfill my work, even optimize it.

Pros

I have worked in a free software environment and I have tried other similar LibreOffice options, and the latter is the one I liked the most. It is very comfortable and easy to use, you do not need training to start working with that. It has some qualities that are distinguished: You can work on Linux, Windows and Mac; is free; It occupies little space on the disk and is easy to install. It is functional, works in various extensions, including some that no longer come in private software, but are widely used in special programs such as cartography and geography.

Cons

There is something that I do not like free software in general and that LibreOffice does not escape, it is the technical support assisted by the community that uses it and develops it. Generally, if you have any concerns you should go to the forum, and sometimes these forums can be overwhelming.