I am a senior semi retired I only use Word and Excell is there a discount for just the basics?

Afraid not, you can buy Home & Student lifetime license version

Or you can use one of the free Office type apps that can create/edit MS Office docs eg https://www.libreoffice.org/

Sorry no.

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You do have a couple of options:

• find a friend or family who has 365 Family with an unused "share"
• suggest starting a family 365 Family subscription
• Use Office Online
• buy a one-time payment 2019 license
• use a free Office "alternative"

365 Family allows a total of 6 people to "share" the same subscription, ie US$17 each per year at no extra cost.  The first thing to do is ask around and see if any friends or family already have 365 Family that they have not fully "shared" yet.

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Next, collect a group of 6 people who would like to share a 365 Family subscription. Family is a good place to start, but a group of friends with common interests, ie a club or seniors group, are also good options.

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Office Online is free with the email account you used to post here.  It gives you "dumbed down" versions of the Office applications to use. They are more than adequate for basic use that you are likely to put them to.

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One time payment Office 2019 Home and Student costs US$150, it will be usable (supported by MS) until October 2025, ie $30 per year ...

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Finally, there are 3rd party alternatives to Office. Some still use the old Menu system. They recreate most of the functions in "real" Office programs, and most of the time can create "real" Office format files.

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There are "stand alone", "full", versions of Word and Excel (if you can find them) for between $80 and $130 each. But at that price you might as well buy Office Home and Student.

The first thing to do on your journey to get Office is make a list of the things you want to do with it. What sort of features do you want/need.

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This next article goes into more detail on the options, including links to some of the office alternatives.

The article got too long for the forum, so I moved it to a Word document and uploaded it to OneDrive.  You can view or download it from here:

https://1drv.ms/w/s!Am8lVyUzjKfpoGos7ovI66isqzKN?e=kqK1Qj

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Short form, you have several basic options:

.  #1 Office Online, free, but not fully functional

.  #2 Office 365 Family, "free", if you can get a "share" from someone who has paid, on up to 5 computers

.  #3 Office 2019 Home and Student, buy with 1-time payment, 1 computer

.  #4 Office 365 Personal, rent / pay-forever US$70/year, 1 user, up to 5 computers

.  #5 Office 365 Family, rent / pay for-ever US$100/year, up to 6 users, each on up to 5 computers

.  #6 Non-MS alternatives to Office, not exactly identical, but free or cheap

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Unfortunately, "buying" Office has become a big decision tree.

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You can take the easy way out and rent Office 365 forever from MS, at full retail price, (whether you really NEED the "extra" features you are paying for) or you can take some time to investigate all of the options to find the best deal for you.

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If you meet the right conditions, you really can get Office for FREE or much cheaper than everyone else who is paying the full retail price.

Check out the wiki I go into more detail outlining these options:

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You will have to decide for yourself. You can to trade off long term cost and features If your needs are very simple, you won’t need to spend much or work with one of the free options. But if you are a more “advanced” user, using multiple Office applications and sharing documents/files with others you will have to pay for one of the “Microsoft” (Office) 365 / Office 2019 bundles.