Microsoft Word and Google Docs are hands down some of the best word processors presently available on the internet. Both of them offer numerous features and tools to cater to the word processing needs of the customer community. They function quite alike and at times they are considered interchangeable by many customers.
Both these software are backed by the internet and software giants like Microsoft and Google and this explains how they manage to acquire the best and most advanced technology in the field. One of the major similarities of both platforms is that they are both available to the customers for free. No charge is being levied on the customer community for using any of the platforms and amidst many other platforms that charge a good amount on the customers, these two are positively different.
The following section tries to cover the major benefits, advantages, and downsides of both Microsoft Word and Google Docs.
Microsoft Word
Microsoft Word is one of the most popular, reliable, and celebrated word processing software. Conceived, created, and maintained by the software tycoon Microsoft, it offers the best in town to the customers.
One of the most prominent reasons behind the popularity enjoyed by Microsoft Word is the easy availability and access that the users get to the platform. It can be seen that when a person buys a desktop computer and install any operating system, the office applications will be already installed in them and Microsoft Word would be one of them. this shows the fact that Word is available in most operating systems and they are made available to the customers free of cost.
Another reason why Microsoft Word is popular amidst the customer community is the simple user interface that it manages to maintain. The users will not be confused with the options and working procedures of Word even if they are visiting for the first time. There are no unwanted options, steps, or anything that hinders the simple understanding of how the application works.
Google Docs
Google Docs, being backed by internet and search engine giant Google came into the word processing field much later than Microsoft Word. But despite being the youngest member, it managed to fetch lion’s share of the community towards it in a very short period. Although there are many reasons behind the instant and immediate popularity enjoyed by the application, one of the major reasons among them is that it is accessible to everyone across the world. If you have a valid Gmail Id, you can have access to the Google Docs application, you are not even expected to download any apparatus for that either.
The immense possibilities of collaboration are another reason behind the popularity of this application. Being a Google application, it can, by default, collaborate or integrate with all the applications in the Google Workspace. Along with them, numerous other third-party applications are also available to be integrated with Google docs, like Grammarly.
Microsoft word vs Google Docs
Accessibility
It was already mentioned that both the applications are accessible to the users in the best way possible. But there is a catch to that. The point that Microsoft Word is highly accessible would only be true if the computer that you are using is installed with the Microsoft 365 package. The Word is not available as a stand-alone application, but rather available only as a part of the pack of Office or Microsoft applications which will only be made available if the pack is installed on the device. The customer will have to pay for the entire pack and its facilities, and then only it will be installed and then the user can use the Word free of cost for the rest of the time.
But when it comes to Google Docs, it is totally free. You don’t need to pay to have a valid email id, and thus, you don’t need to pay anything for Google Docs either.
Offline use
One of the upper hands that Microsoft gets is that it can be used even when the device is offline and there is no internet connection available at the moment. The content can even be safely saved when being offline.
But Google Docs can only be accessed when there is internet available and thus, cannot be used when the device is offline.
Collaboration
When it comes to Google Docs, the user or users can share the document that you are working on with anyone across the world and let them edit the document with you together in real-time. This kind of collaboration is possible only for Google Docs, as Microsoft Word does not have a provision to include other people to access the document to work on it together.
