What's new and improved in Office 2016 for Mac

Make Your Messages Accessible

In Outlook

Find and fix accessibility issues while composing messages or invitations by using the Accessibility Checker.

Learn more about using the Accessibility Checker to find and resolve accessibility issues.

Zoom Playback

In PowerPoint

You can now view interactive summaries and automatic navigation links that were created using the Zoom command in PowerPoint 2016 for Windows.

More Functions *

In Excel

Use CONCAT or TEXTJOIN to shorten your text formulas, or try the forecasting functions to help you see the future.

Learn more about the CONCAT and TEXTJOIN functions.

^{* Requires an Office 365 subscription}

Audio and Video Playback *

In PowerPoint

Take advantage of improved options to play back your audio and video files.

Learn more about setting the 'Playback' options for a video in your presentation.

^{* Requires an Office 365 subscription}

Make Sure Your Notes Are Accessible

In OneNote

Find and fix accessibility issues in your notes using the Accessibility on the Tools menu.

Learn more about using the Accessibility Checker to find and resolve accessibility issues.

Spell Checker Improvements

In OneNote

Hey, we all make mistakes. Correct your typos with suggestions from the spell checker.

Learn more about checking spelling.

Designer *

In PowerPoint

You supply the pictures, we'll supply the high-quality, professional design ideas for your slides.

Learn more about PowerPoint Designer.

^{* Requires an Office 365 subscription}

Color Your Guides *

In PowerPoint

Choose a color to make your guides stand out against the slide background.

Learn more about using grids and guides.

^{* Requires an Office 365 subscription}

Focus Mode *

In Word

Switch to Focus on the View menu to remove distractions and concentrate on your work.

Learn more about bringing focus to the content in your document.

^{* Requires an Office 365 subscription}

64 Bit Support ^

In Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, and Outlook

Enjoy improved performance and reliability when working with very large files.

^{^ This feature is rolling out in a staggered fashion so it may not be available to you immediately.}

Stay on Top of Your Travel and Deliveries *

In Outlook

View simplified summary cards in your travel confirmation and package delivery emails, and in your calendar.

^{* Requires an Office 365 subscription that includes Exchange Online and new or upgraded Outlook.com accounts.}

Get Someone's Attention *

In Outlook

Add the @ symbol followed by a person's name to the body of an email or calendar item, and they will be automatically added to the To line of the message.

Learn more about using @mentions to get someone's attention.

^{* Requires an Office 365 subscription}

Accessibility Checker

In Word, Excel, and PowerPoint

Find and fix accessibility issues with your document, spreadsheet, or presentation using the Accessibility Checker on the Review tab.

Learn more about using the Accessibility Checker to find and fix accessibility issues.

Suggest a Feature

In Outlook

Propose an idea for a new feature, or vote on someone else's suggestion by using Suggest a Feature on the Help menu.

Animate Your Background *

In PowerPoint

Make your slides more dynamic with an animated background image.

Learn more about animating the background of your slides.

^{* Requires an Office 365 subscription}

No Warnings When Saving as CSV *

In Excel

You asked for it! We will no longer show a warning about feature loss when saving a worksheet as a CSV file.

^{* Requires an Office 365 subscription}

Stylus Setting

In OneNote

Choose what happens when your stylus is detected: automatically switch to drawing or keep using it as a mouse.

Shared with Me *

In Word, Excel, and PowerPoint

See documents, workbooks, and presentations others have been recently shared with you.

Learn more about see files others have shared with you.

^{* Requires an Office 365 subscription}

More Control Over Objects

In Word

The Selection Pane makes keeping track of all the objects in your document easy and provides better control over their ordering.

Learn more about managing objects with the Selection Pane.

Better Interaction

In Word

Date pickers, drop down lists, and many other content controls in your documents are now interactive.

Ink Annotations

In OneNote

Use your mouse or trackpad to write, draw, and highlight with the tools on the new Draw tab.

Learn more about drawing and annotating with ink.

Tidier Notes

In OneNote

Grid and lined page backgrounds will keep your handwriting and drawings neat and tidy.

Pen Tablet Support

In OneNote

Use your drawing tablet or display that uses a pen or a stylus to write, draw, and erase in your notes.

Export to Video *

^{In PowerPoint}

You asked for it! You can now export your presentation to a video that you can then burn to a disc, upload to the web, or email.

Learn more about exporting your presentation as a different file format.

^{* Requires an Office 365 subscription}

Export to ODF Support

^{In Word, Excel, and PowerPoint}

You can now export documents, spreadsheets, and presentations to the OpenDocument Spreadsheet (.ods), OpenDocument Text (.odt), and OpenDocument Presentation (.odp) formats.

Learn more about supported file types.

Full Customization of the Ribbon and Quick Access Toolbar *

^{In Word, Excel, and PowerPoint}

You can now fully customize the Ribbon and the Quick Access Toolbar so that they work best for you. You can create tabs and groups as well as rename and reorder tabs, groups, and commands.

Learn more about customizing the ribbon and the Quick Access Toolbar.

^{* Full Ribbon customization requires an Office 365 subscription}

Class Notebook Tools *

^{In OneNote}

Are you a teacher looking to more efficiently manage your notebooks? You can now distribute pages and sections to students, quickly review their work, more easily access the Class Notebook app.

Learn more about the Class Notebook Tools.

^{* Only available to Org-ID user/teacher}

Right-to-Left (RTL) Support

^{In Outlook}

You asked for it and we're happy to add support for two highly requested languages: Arabic and Hebrew.

Learn more about typing in a bi-directional language.

Better Authoring and Formatting Options

^{In Outlook}

Many more options are now available to you when you're drafting messages. You can choose from more fonts and colors, and more list styles. You can also insert hyperlinks, resize and format pictures, and take advantage of AutoCorrect.

Learn more about formatting email messages, inserting pictures, and resizing a picture in an email message.

Closed Captions and Multiple Audio Tracks

^{In PowerPoint}

Some videos can contain a combination of captions, subtitles, and audio tracks. When you insert a video into a presentation that contains closed captions tracks or multiple audio tracks, you can now play all of them in slideshow.

Learn more about the supported Closed Caption file types.

Shared Notifications

^{In OneNote}

Ever wonder if a shared notebook (stored on OneDrive) you use on a regular basis has been updated? Worry no longer! Just check the Notification Center to find out.

Discover Office Add-Ins

^{Excel and Word}

Ready to be productive? You can now find out which new add-ins are available in the Store right from the Insert menu in Excel and Word, and quickly install them to increase your productivity.

Learn more about getting add-ins.

Archiving & De-cluttering

^{In Outlook}

Ready to de-clutter your Inbox without worries of losing items? You can now quickly move an item stored in your Inbox or any other folder to an archive folder. Once moved, the archived items remain accessible and can easily be restored to their original location.

Learn more about archiving messages.

Right-to-Left (RTL) Support

^{In Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote}

You asked for it and we're happy to add support for two highly requested languages: Arabic and Hebrew.

Learn more about typing in a bi-directional language.

Morph *

^{In PowerPoint}

Create seamless transitions between slides and bring motion to your presentations to more effectively convey concepts and information.

Learn more about using the Morph transition.

^{* Requires an Office 365 subscription}

Quick Access Toolbar Customization

^{In Word, Excel, and PowerPoint}

Use a command often and want quick access to it? Now you can add more commands, such as New, Print, and Save, to the top-left corner of the app window and make them more easily accessible.

Learn more about customizing the Quick Access Toolbar.

Forward Message

^{In Outlook}

You asked for it so we brought it back. You can now use your trusty (Command-J) shortcut to forward a message.

More control over objects

^{In Excel and PowerPoint}

The Selection Pane makes keeping track of all the objects on a worksheet easy and provides better control over their ordering.

Learn more about managing objects with the Selection Pane.

Full Screen view

^{In Outlook}

It's now easier than ever to view multiple Outlook items, such as messages and invitations, side-by-side.

Learn more about using Full Screen view.

Room Finder

^{In Outlook}

This feature is making it easier to find a convenient location when scheduling a meeting by showing the conference rooms available at your desired time.

Learn more about creating a meeting or appointment.

Scholarly Style

^{In Word}

Bringing more flexibility by supporting the creation of custom citation styles.

Learn more about adding citations.

Insert Screenshot

^{In Word, Excel, and PowerPoint}

Ever wanted to take a screen capture of an open app, or clip a portion of the screen and insert the image in another app? Now you can!

Learn more about inserting a screenshot.

Additional File Format Support

^{In Word, Excel, and PowerPoint}

OpenDocument files can now be opened and viewed in Word, Excel and PowerPoint.

Learn more about supported file formats.

New addition to the QAT

^{In Word}

You've asked for it! The Print command has been added to the Quick Access Toolbar.

Citation Styles Updates

^{In Word}

Citation style formats (Harvard and IEEE ) and versions (MLA and APA) are now available to ensure that your papers are in compliance with the most recent published guidelines.

Learn more about adding citations.

Look and Feel Improvements

^{In Excel}

Crisper display of fonts on non-retina displays and smoother scrolling are making using Excel on your Mac a more natural and more enjoyable experience.

New Chinese and Japanese Fonts

^{In Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and OneNote}

New default fonts with a modern look and feel are improving readability and improving compatibility with the Windows versions of the apps.

Visual Basic Editor Improvements

^{In Word, Excel, and Outlook}

It's now easy to add modules and references as well as use debug shortcuts in the Visual Basic Editor.

Outlook.com Account Support

^{In Outlook}

If you are an Outlook.com Preview customer, you can add your Outlook.com account using the updated Accounts page and get full access to your Mail, Calendar and Contacts.

Easy sharing and collaboration

^{In Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote}

Get more done by working together using built-in tools to share and review files.

Learn more about sharing files in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote.

Cloud Connected

^{In Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and OneNote}

Office 2016 for Mac is integrated with OneDrive, OneDrive for Business, and SharePoint which enables you to access your Office documents from anywhere and any device.

PivotTable Slicers

^{In Excel}

New PivotTable Slicers help you discover patterns in large volumes of data.

Propose New Time

^{In Outlook}

Want to make a meeting but have a conflict? You can now propose a time that would work better for you to the meeting organizer.

Requires an Exchange account.

Learn more about proposing a new meeting time.

Threaded Comments

^{In Word and PowerPoint}

Simultaneously work with others and use threaded comments to have a conversation, in context, right next to relevant text.

Learn more about inserting or replying to comments.

Design Tab

^{In PowerPoint and Word}

The new Design tab gives you access to a great selection of themes and variants, and lets you apply designer-quality layouts, fonts, and colors to your documents and presentations.

Learn more about customizing and saving a theme.

Redesigned Ribbon

^{In Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and OneNote}

The redesigned ribbon menu intuitively organizes features so you can quickly find what you need.

Keyboard Shortcuts

^{In Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and OneNote}

Control shortcuts, like CONTROL + S for Save on a Windows PC, now work on the Mac too.

Learn more about keyboard shortcuts for Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and OneNote.

Designed for Mac

^{In Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and OneNote}

Enjoy the familiar Office experience with the best of Mac. Text and graphics look sharper than ever on Retina displays, and familiar Multi-Touch gestures are now supported for zooming.