Licensing Microsoft Office for Mobile Devices

The Excel, OneNote, PowerPoint, and Word Office applications from Microsoft are available for Apple iOS and Google Android devices. The locally installed applications will be valuable for mobile business users who need to review documents received in e-mail, perform edits, deliver presentations, and keep notes on their devices. However, if bring-your-own-device (BYOD) users are not properly licensed for these applications, the decisions they make independently could put the organization on the hook for Office 365 commercial-level subscriptions. A handful of options exist that may help mitigate the risks.

This report covers licensing smartphones and tablets for the mobile Office applications. Currently, Excel, OneNote, PowerPoint, and Word functionality is available for installation and use on Apple iOS and Google Android devices. Lync and Outlook Web App mobile applications follow different licensing rules and are not discussed here. Similarly, Office applications for tablets running Windows (or Windows RT) and smartphones running the Windows Phone OS follow another set of different licensing rules and are not covered in this report.