Office 2021 LTSC, Office 2024 or Microsoft 365?
One of these bills you every month for the rest of your life. That is the whole decision; everything else is detail.
Updated 2026-08-24
The one difference that matters
Microsoft 365 is a subscription. Stop paying and the applications fall back to a read-only mode: your files are still yours, but editing them means paying again. Office 2021 and Office 2024 are perpetual licences — you buy the version, and it keeps working for as long as the machine does.
Everything else in this comparison is small next to that. Decide whether you want a bill or a purchase, and the rest follows.
What each one gives you
- —Office Professional Plus 2021 (LTSC) — Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and Access on one Windows PC. The long-term servicing build: security updates, no feature changes, nothing moving under you.
- —Office Professional Plus 2024 — the same applications in the current perpetual release, again one Windows PC, again bought outright.
- —Microsoft 365 — the same applications plus cloud storage, mobile and web versions and continuous feature updates, across several devices, for as long as you keep paying.
Five years of each
A subscription is priced to look small. Multiply it out before deciding: a personal Microsoft 365 plan at roughly seventy dollars a year is about three hundred and fifty dollars over five years, and you own nothing at the end of it. A perpetual licence bought here is a one-off in the region of fifteen to twenty dollars.
That gap is the honest reason perpetual Office is worth considering, and the honest reason Microsoft would rather sell you the subscription.
Which to pick
If you write documents, keep spreadsheets, and want the thing to sit still and work: the 2021 LTSC build, and pocket the difference. It is the cheaper of the two perpetual releases and the more predictable of them.
Choose 2024 if you specifically want the current release. Choose Microsoft 365 if you genuinely use the cloud storage, need the applications across several devices including a phone, or work somewhere that requires the newest features — the subscription earns its money in that case and not otherwise.
Quick answers
- Does Office 2021 stop working after a year?
- No. It is a perpetual licence: you pay once and it keeps working. Only a Microsoft 365 subscription stops when the payments stop.
- What is the difference between Office 2021 and Office 2021 LTSC?
- LTSC is the long-term servicing build. It receives security updates but not new features, which is what you want on a machine that should behave the same next year as it does today.
- Can I install a perpetual Office licence on more than one computer?
- No. Each licence covers one Windows PC. You can move it to a replacement machine, but it is not two seats.
What this is about
Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2021 LTSC
Buy it once. No subscription, no renewal date.
- delivery
- Instant key
- region
- Global
- availability
- in stock
Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2024
The current perpetual Office. One payment, one PC.
- delivery
- Instant key
- region
- Global
- availability
- in stock