Key Takeaways

  • Microsoft Office can be run on a Chromebook through the Microsoft 365 web app suite, which offers word processing, spreadsheet, and collaboration tools.
  • Chromebook users can also utilize Parallels Desktop for Chrome OS to run the full Windows version of Microsoft Office, primarily for business users.
  • While the options for running Microsoft Office on Chromebooks are more limited, users can still access the necessary functionality either through web apps or by running Windows 10 on Chrome OS using Parallels Desktop.

Microsoft Office is the most popular productivity suite in the world. If you use one of the best Chromebooks as your daily driver for work or school, you probably want to run at least one Microsoft app. From word processing to computational tasks with Excel, Office has everything you need to complete the job. While Microsoft does not offer a native ChromeOS app, there are several viable ways to run Office apps on a Chromebook.

How to run Microsoft Office on a Chromebook

Using Microsoft 365 web apps

The best option for running Microsoft Office on a Chromebook is via the Microsoft 365 web app suite. You can use Office for the Web in your browser to create, edit, and collaborate on files from your Chromebook. This approach also feels natural since your Chromebook was built for cloud computing. Plus, you don't need to install anything, therefore saving storage space in the process.

Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote are all present as web apps, as are Outlook, OneDrive, Skype, People, Calendar, Sway, and Forms. All of these apps have limited free functionality, so you'll need to pay for a Microsoft 365 subscription to get the full feature set. If you're a student or teacher, you can likely get Microsoft 365 for free through your school or university. Anyone can also get a free one-month trial.

Those planning to use the web app approach to Office should consider adding shortcuts for them to your app drawer. You can also pin them to your shelf if you want, so that office will always be a click away. There's also a nifty Chrome extension for Microsoft Office, allowing even easier access right inside your browser.

Using Parallels

=Parallels Desktop in ChromeOS
Source: Parallels 

Perhaps you want to run the full Windows version of Microsoft Office. This is possible thanks to Parallels Desktop for Chrome OS. It is important to note that, currently, Parallels Desktop for Chrome OS is available only to enterprise Chromebook customers, so this is a useful option for business users.

The Parallels software runs a full version of Windows 10 inside a container on your Chromebook. With a full version of Windows installed on your Chrome OS device, you can easily download and run the full desktop version of every Office app. There are some key advantages of this method. Most importantly, you retain all the power of the Microsoft apps. Some pro features, such as the Data Analysis ToolPak in Excel, are missing from the web and Android apps. Running Parallels on your Chromebook allows access to all the functionality found only in the desktop apps.

There are fewer options for running Microsoft Office on Chromebooks than there used to be, but there are still ways to get access. Most users will have to use the web app, while business users may want to explore the option of using Parallels Desktop to run Windows 10 on Chrome OS. Either way, if you work with spreadsheets and documents all day, consider a nice docking station to simplify your workflow.