Tech giant Microsoft finally removed the preview label on its Office apps making it available for smartphones running on the Android platform. Microsoft made the announcement on Wednesday, five weeks after the company released the preview version across 83 countries and 1,900 supported Android smartphone models.
Microsoft corporate vice president Kirk Koenigsbauer released a public statement saying, "We heard from thousands of these users and over the last few weeks we were able to incorporate a lot of their feedback into the apps we're launching today."
Three Office apps will be released for the Android platform; Word, Excel and PowerPoint. While the apps are still free to download, they still require huge system resources to run.
In order for the apps to work seamlessly, an Android smartphone must have at least 1 gigabyte of internal memory and must run on Android 4.4 KitKat operating system or a much later version.
Microsoft first released its set of Office suite for tablets running on the Android platform in February and subsequently released it on Android smartphones in May, albeit as a preview version only.
According to CNet, a yearly subscription to Office 365 is needed if users want to unlock more mobile features and well as use the desktop version of the app. This strategy was implemented by Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella in order to broaden the support for Microsoft's software.
Microsoft is planning to push forward with its OEM plans in order to incorporate Office apps on more smartphone models, according to Android Police. It won't be a surprise if Android smartphones in the future will be released pre-loaded with Microsoft Office apps.