What you need to know
Microsoft Office Long Term Servicing Channel for Windows and Office 2021 for Mac are available in public preview.
These versions of Office don’t require a subscription, instead of being available as a one-time purchase.
Microsoft Teams will ship with these versions of Office rather than Skype for Business.
Microsoft Office Long Term Servicing Channel (LTSC) for Windows and Office 2021 for Mac are now available in public preview. These new versions of Office don’t require a subscription but also don’t receive any new features. They’re intended for regulated devices that can’t get updates for years at a time, devices that aren’t connected to the internet, and systems that must stay locked in time.
Office LTSC has all of the features from its predecessor plus a “subset of new features already available in Microsoft 365 Apps for enterprise,” according to a Microsoft Tech Community Post. The post does not share a list of the new features for Office LTSC. Previously, Microsoft shared that “Dynamic Arrays and XLOOKUP in Excel, dark mode support across multiple apps, and performance improvements across Word, Excel, Outlook, and PowerPoint,” will be in the new version of Office LTSC.
Like Windows 10 LTSC, Office LTSC will be supported for five years and be governed by the Fixed Lifecycle Policy.
Office LTSC Preview
There are SIX different options for Office LTSC preview and the final public releases.
Office LTSC Professional Plus 2021 Preview
Word, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, OneNote, Publisher, Access.
Skype for Business and Teams will be in the final release.
Project Professional 2021 Preview
Visio Professional 2021 Preview
Go to https://www.base64decode.org/ and decode below url
For
Windows 32-bit
aHR0cHM6Ly9kcml2ZS5nb29nbGUuY29tL2ZpbGUvZC8xVGxXSWlnYnJLUUs2UUltMnlnNU1MdERlWTZpWjF4bmEvdmlldz91c3A9c2hhcmluZw==
OR
Windows 64-bit (recommended)
aHR0cHM6Ly9kcml2ZS5nb29nbGUuY29tL2ZpbGUvZC8xamNlQ2ZBa0FCY1NsRVdGRE9icFVwVnltdlJGbk16QnUvdmlldz91c3A9c2hhcmluZw==
There will be a MacOS version of Office LTSC but not as a public preview. MacOS gets an Office 2021 preview.
Requirements for the Office LTSC preview
Before you rush to download the Office LTSC Preview, make sure you have everything necessary to make it work.
Not just any Windows 10 will work with Office LTSC. According to Microsoft you’ll need one of these volume licence variants.
Windows 10 Semi-Annual Channel
Windows 10 LTSC 2019
Windows Server 2019
There’s no technical reason for this requirement. It seems Microsoft wants to limit access of Office LTSC to volume licenced, corporate customers only.
According to Microsoft, you’ll need a minimum of 4GB memory for Office LTSC. We think that’s ridiculously low. A minimum of 8GB is realistic for modern Office (LTSC, 2021, 2021 or 365).
Installation
It’s not the usual ‘download and install’ procedure. Like all volume licence versions of Office, installation is done via the Office Deployment Tool (ODT) or Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager.
