Office Web Apps Advantages

If you've used any of the Office 2007 programs, the Ribbon interface has probably grown on you. Although Office Web Apps' Ribbons are very pared-down compared to the desktop counterparts, the familiar graphical user interface may make it easier for Web-based workers to get started with Office Web Apps. (You can also hide the Office Web Apps Ribbons if you need more working space, as laptop/netbook users often do.)

Even if you're not accustomed to the Ribbon toolbar, Office Web Apps' interface -- simpler than the desktop version -- is easy to understand. The icons are also larger and more characteristic than those in Google Docs and Zoho Office.

All of the Office Web applications include a prominent "Open in [Word/Excel/PowerPoint/OneNote]" button on the Ribbon. Click on that handy button to work on the document in the corresponding Office 2010 desktop application, accessing the desktop app's greater functionality and speed.

Similarly, you can save documents directly from within Office 2010 desktop applications to Windows Live SkyDrive, where you can manipulate documents in your browser using Office Web Apps.

This seamless integration makes porting your documents to the cloud and downloading Office files to the desktop very convenient.

Office 2010 allows you to continue working on files saved on SkyDrive even if you don't have an Internet connection. Offline mode, saves your file locally and automatically tries to sync to the Web when a connection is available. This ensures that the files you access either from Office Web Apps or the desktop are the most current ones  -- whether or not you have an Internet connection (a great benefit when traveling).

You can also keep Office Web Apps documents automatically synced between your computer and SkyDrive via Windows Live Sync -- one of Microsoft's services for syncing your data across multiple devices. This is especially useful for mobile professionals and remote workers, who often need to access their most recently updated documents from multiple locations. File syncing also offers important -- and often undervalued -- off-site backup for home office users.

As of this writing, neither Google Docs nor Zoho Office provide automatic file syncing -- you need to use a third-party tool or manually upload/save files to store them in these Web applications.

This is more of a SkyDrive benefit than a strictly Office Web Apps one, but you can store up to 25 GB of Office documents in SkyDrive (where they can be created, edited, or shared via Office Web Apps). Google Docs, by comparison, offers up to 1 GB of free file storage (files to be converted to Google Docs get less space), and Zoho Docs offers 1 GB of storage as well.

More online storage space plus automatic file/folder syncing means mobile professionals can have the most essential -- and then some -- files accessible wherever they are.

Compared to other online office suites, Office Web Apps naturally retains more of the formatting of documents created in Microsoft Office. Even documents with complex formatting (background images, pivot tables, etc.) look the same in Office Web Apps as they do on the desktop. The screenshot here (click for larger image) shows a Word document in Office Web Apps (at left) which looks exactly like it does within Word on the desktop compared to the Google Docs version (at right).

File formatting consistency is an especially important feature when you need to share a document or collaborate with others from afar. Because Office Web Apps preserves the formatting of most Office documents, using these applications online is almost like working on a document over a local network -- seeing the document as it was meant to be seen.