Google docs just isn’t good enough for some of my needs and I installed both OnlyOffice and LibreOffice on my W11 PC.
At work we use MS Office and ideally I maintain some compatibility if I ever need to share documents. I don’t use extreme Office features, but use some simpler Excel and Word (header, footer, TOC etc.) features. No macros. So, i will use docx and xlsx format for the time being.
I also may have a need to edit some simple PDF.
I used some random work spreadsheets and Word documents and they all opened fine on both LibreOffice and OnlyOffice. Libre seems to have more features, OnlyOffice looks cleaner.
I want to test both for a bit, but want to decide which to move forward with. I don’t care one bit about FOSS, or that one is a company. it is al about user experience and file format compatibility. for the time being, Linux is only on a living room PC, so I can’t test the Linux version of each properly.
Since I can’t test all scenarios, I was wondering if someone here can advise on possible pitfalls or things to look out for?
if you’re needcase is heavy compatibility with ms-office and its formats check for softmaker-office. yes it’s propetary software but the price is fair in comparision to the ms-office. their focus is explicit ms-office and it’s used in a lot of commercial businesses to fully replace ms-office when ms-office is not allowed due to it’s security-risk in use. collabora is another one you can check. only-office ? there are discussions about the russian-ownership and that parts of only-office are closed source but there is a replacement in the pipeline, euro-office that is a fork of only office and this will replace the closed-parts of only-office with foss. it’s contributors are commercial companies that are replacing only-office in their ecosystem. check out for softmaker and collabora as additional candidates in your search.
Libre Office - Built off of OpenOffice and meant for ODF and has the ability to edit and open docx.
OnlyOffice - Built for complete microsoft office document compatibility, and offers a self hosted alternative to 365. They cloned the UI as much as possible specifically for MS converts. Replacing 365 is essentially their mission statement.
Yea OnlyOffice is your closest complete MS alrenative that will open all word and excell documents without any formatting errors.
I have switched about a dozen businesses to OnlyOffice without issue, LibreOffice not so much unless you plan on converting to ODF.
I’ve been trying to write a text document with TOC and outline format on both.
I use MS Word for that at work a lot. While that isn’t perfect, it is far superior to Libre and OnlyOffice. On Only Office the OC gets screwed up whenever i change a heading with a tab or similar. And in Libre the the outline format isn’t consistent and how it is being applied.
And their help is no help at all and tells me things can be set, where there is no such setting. Like the help refers to some old version.
Fortunately I don’t have to write a lot and Google docs should suffice. If I had to actually write in any capacity, I would have to subscribe to MS Office.
Both programs appear to work initially. But once you have multiple paragraphs and want to apply consistent indenting and outline formats, it all gets screwed up.
I ended up using OnlyOffice the last few months. And I’m happy with it. I use the default MS file formats.
Reasons I didn’t use Libre Office:
By default they use ODF. While that is an open standard, I read ODF isn’t equally well implemented in all software and you don’t get the universal usability you are after. A user who never shares files won’t care either way. But if yo share files, MS format seems to be a better choice
It looks old and unusual if you come from MS Office. I know, subjective. You can change how it looks and maybe emulate MS Office. But if you do that, all tutorials will be less useful as they will use the default look
OnlyOffice is easy to learn once you methodically google for things and don’t just use it like MS Office. IT works similar to MS Office, but some details differ. One thing I noticed, their help is either outdated, or written for a different OS. In no case i was able to follow their guide since My OnlyOffice didn’t have what they were talking about. But using Google (Gemini) 99% gave me an easy to follow tutorial for each. Google for what you want to do, and include that you use the Linux version.
I do like it is a single software for all tools (word processor, PDF, spreadsheet, PowerPoint).
I don’t know how well MS Office compatibility works IRL. I suspect you will get an occasional formatting error. But OnlyOffice heavily focusing on MS file formats makes me think, they will be better for that.
