The new productivity suite now costs more for consumers

Oct 30, 2018 04:15 GMT  ·  By

Microsoft has recently made Windows 10 more expensive for consumers in the United States, and now the company does the same thing for the Office 2019 productivity suite as well.

While the price of the Home & Student version of Office 2019 has remained unchanged at $149.99, consumers need to pay 9 percent more for the Home & Business version as compared to how much they spent on Office 2016.

This particular version now costs $249.99, up from $229.99, according to a report from CW.

The most expensive version continues to be Office 2019 Professional, and this is also the release that suffered the biggest price increase of 10 percent. Consumers now have to pay $439.99 for Office 2019 Pro, up from $399.99 for Office 2016 Pro.

Pushing consumers to Office 365?

While Microsoft hasn’t explained why exactly it increases Office prices, the move was actually announced earlier this year, and it is believed to be an attempt to push more consumers towards Office 365.

As compared to Office 2019, Office 365 comes with as a subscription-based service and is updated regularly with new features. Office 2019, on the other hand, wouldn’t get any other new features, and updates would only be aimed at fixing bugs and addressing security vulnerabilities.

Earlier this month, it was discovered that Microsoft increased Windows 10 prices in the United States, with the Home version now being sold for $139.99, up from $119.99. On the other hand, the Pro version is still available for $199.99 just like before.

There’s a chance that with the price increase, Microsoft also wants to steer consumers to the Pro version of the OS that comes with several extra benefits.

It remains to be seen how the price hikes will be received by potential buyers, but for now, both Windows and Office are getting more expensive for everyone.