{"slug": "libreoffice", "name": "LibreOffice", "category": "other", "category_name": "Other software", "description": "Free, open-source office suite with word processor, spreadsheet, presentation and database apps.", "recommenders": 37, "commenters": 55, "warners": 8, "score": 29.198, "rising": 11.78, "first": "2025-11-01", "latest": "2026-10-24", "why": "Commenters use it as a free, local office suite for everyday work, often on Linux, and report exchanging files with MS Office users with few problems.", "why_is_quote": false, "has_verdict": true, "sentiment": {"recommend": 38, "neutral": 6, "compare": 5, "warn": 7}, "spark": [2, 0, 3, 5, 2, 3, 2, 3, 0, 5, 10, 3], "listed": true, "loved": ["Real daily work", "Linux desktop"], "caveat": "Dated, clunky UI", "short_quote": "And it works really well. I can use it and exchange documents with people using Word without problem", "icon": true, "domain": "libreoffice.org", "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://www.libreoffice.org", "pricing": "open source", "aliases": ["LibreOffice"], "verdict": [{"text": "Commenters use it as a free, local office suite for everyday work, often on Linux,", "cites": [{"id": 793775904, "item_id": 49610994, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49610994", "by": "rietta", "date": "2026-09-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It is my real office suite I use for real work and real business accounting tasks.", "excerpt": "This is awesome! I have used LibreOffice (and Open Office) extensively for decades now. It is my real office suite I use for real work and real business accounting tasks. Yes, I am very well aware that Calc is different than Excel but it can get nearly all the same tasks done as long as you are not tied deep into a corporate environment passing Excel-specific files around. I have also made great business uses of it i", "context": "donates $19/month to the foundation", "use_case": "office work, accounting, PDF generation", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice breaks download records after declaring it has no AI features"}, {"id": 791224608, "item_id": 49451538, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49451538", "by": "Night_Thastus", "date": "2026-08-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I am very grateful for LibreOffice. Writer and Calc got me through college", "excerpt": "I am very grateful for LibreOffice. Writer and Calc got me through college, and I use Calc on a nearly daily basis for keeping track of finances. Years ago they felt unpolished and a bit pet-project-y, but now they feel like proper tools that stand up well. I think for the business scene Excel will remain dominant for shear backwards compatibility, but for typical users there's no reason not to use it.", "context": "", "use_case": "documents and finances spreadsheets", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice 26.8 Released with Many Nice Improvements"}, {"id": 733377392, "item_id": 45836087, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45836087", "by": "k310", "date": "2025-11-06", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "May I recommend Libre Office? [0] For casual/home use, it should meet needs. Free, no subscription.", "excerpt": "May I recommend Libre Office? [0] For casual/home use, it should meet needs. Free, no subscription. Spreadsheet can collaborate. [1] Collabra Office seems to be the port of LibreOffice to ios. (free) Look it up on the app store. > Collabora Office is a text editor, spreadsheet and presentation program based on LibreOffice, the world's most popular Open Source office suite - and now it's on iOS, enhancing your possibi", "context": "", "use_case": "casual home office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "Refund requests flood Microsoft after tricking users into AI upgrades"}, {"id": 800759984, "item_id": 50047499, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50047499", "by": "sombragris", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "And it works really well. I can use it and exchange documents with people using Word without problem", "excerpt": "Lawyer, translator and professor here. I have an Office 365 subscription and I got native Word and other MS Office apps installed on my windows partition. But, since I use Linux on the desktop, and MS chose not to offer their office suite as Linux native apps, and they make it near impossible to use the Windows apps under Wine, I use LibreOffice. And it works really well. I can use it and exchange documents with peop", "context": "lawyer, translator and professor; Linux desktop user", "use_case": "office suite on Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Open-source Microsoft Excel, PowerPoint, and Word replications"}, {"id": 793800672, "item_id": 49612542, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49612542", "by": "p2detar", "date": "2026-09-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I installed LibreOffice on my parents' PC last month", "excerpt": "I don't buy the AI argument. I'd bet on Linux replacing Windows for a good chunk of desktop users. For example, I installed LibreOffice on my parents' PC last month, because I replaced their Windows with Linux Mint.", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite for parents", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice breaks download records after declaring it has no AI features"}]}, {"text": " and report exchanging files with MS Office users with few problems.", "cites": [{"id": 800759984, "item_id": 50047499, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50047499", "by": "sombragris", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "And it works really well. I can use it and exchange documents with people using Word without problem", "excerpt": "Lawyer, translator and professor here. I have an Office 365 subscription and I got native Word and other MS Office apps installed on my windows partition. But, since I use Linux on the desktop, and MS chose not to offer their office suite as Linux native apps, and they make it near impossible to use the Windows apps under Wine, I use LibreOffice. And it works really well. I can use it and exchange documents with peop", "context": "lawyer, translator and professor; Linux desktop user", "use_case": "office suite on Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Open-source Microsoft Excel, PowerPoint, and Word replications"}, {"id": 800747872, "item_id": 50046742, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50046742", "by": "Emoticon4032", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "We have been using LibreOffice in our company for 20+ years, exchanging files with customers and vendors who use MS Office in all its versions during this time. We never had a problem\u2026", "excerpt": "Just curious\u2026 why do you think that? We have been using LibreOffice in our company for 20+ years, exchanging files with customers and vendors who use MS Office in all its versions during this time. We never had a problem\u2026", "context": "company using it for 20+ years", "use_case": "company office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "Open-source Microsoft Excel, PowerPoint, and Word replications"}, {"id": 791221360, "item_id": 49451335, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49451335", "by": "2Gkashmiri", "date": "2026-08-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use it as my day tool as a lawyer,  I use writer and calc alongside office tools", "excerpt": "I have been extensively using LibreOffice alongside office 2019 (using Massgrave) And it is converging more and more. I use it as my day tool as a lawyer, I use writer and calc alongside office tools and i see formatting issues coming less and less. This is after me using it day for 3-4 years daily. Every update makes improvements. Sure its \"slow\" at features but I'm not interested in \"ai\" features so it's fine. It i", "context": "lawyer", "use_case": "daily legal document work", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice 26.8 Released with Many Nice Improvements"}]}, {"text": " The most common complaint is a clunky, dated-looking interface,", "cites": [{"id": 760472304, "item_id": 47529519, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47529519", "by": "smcleod", "date": "2026-03-26", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Libreoffice just feels so clunky and Java-ish to use.", "excerpt": "Not related to donations but product wise Libreoffice just feels so clunky and Java-ish to use. I switched to OnlyOffice a year ago and other than its almost complete lack of settings it's been so much nicer to use.", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice and the Art of Overreacting"}, {"id": 753589600, "item_id": 47099350, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47099350", "by": "Flavius", "date": "2026-02-21", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It looks ancient, worse than office apps from 20 years ago.", "excerpt": "Take a look at these screenshots: https://libreoffice.en.uptodown.com/mac It looks ancient, worse than office apps from 20 years ago.", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite UI", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice blasts OnlyOffice for working with Microsoft to lock users in"}, {"id": 785621024, "item_id": 49101314, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49101314", "by": "fluidcruft", "date": "2026-07-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "LibreOffice's menus are a confusing maze (even when switched into the more ribbon-like mode).", "excerpt": "People say that and I used to agree, but honestly I use neither MS Office nor LibreOffice heavily anymore. Nowadays I can figure out what to do in MS Office very quickly but LibreOffice's menus are a confusing maze (even when switched into the more ribbon-like mode).", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "KOReader"}]}, {"text": " and some say Calc and file sharing fall short for Excel-heavy workplaces.", "cites": [{"id": 735457810, "item_id": 45966113, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45966113", "by": "edferda", "date": "2025-11-18", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Libre office spreadsheets are terrible when compared to Excel.", "excerpt": "I\u2019ve been using Windows my entire life. In the past, I tried Linux without much success, switching back within a few weeks. However, Microsoft\u2019s software is just beyond bad these days. Simple actions take seconds, the UI/UX feels designed to make you waste time, and the fundamentals of what an OS should do feel broken. It\u2019s hard to overstate how bad quality has gotten. This motivated me to move to Linux and installed", "context": "lifelong Windows user, uses Windows at work", "use_case": "spreadsheets", "switched_from": "", "story": "Windows 11 adds AI agent that runs in background with access to personal folders"}, {"id": 802215602, "item_id": 50138475, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50138475", "by": "remuskaos", "date": "2026-10-18", "stance": "warn", "quote": "LibreOffice and Collabora don't seem to be there yet.", "excerpt": "Same question I've had in the other comment. What is your preferred alternative to SharePoint? Because we do need document sharing, and I don't see a viable way away from Excel for us. Right now we're sharing Excel files on network drives, which is horrible for versioning files, so I'd rather prefer something like SharePoint, but not from Microsoft. LibreOffice and Collabora don't seem to be there yet. Personally, I ", "context": "company entrenched in Excel", "use_case": "Excel alternative", "switched_from": "", "story": "Microsoft Teams is a red flag"}, {"id": 802214259, "item_id": 50138391, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50138391", "by": "remuskaos", "date": "2026-10-18", "stance": "warn", "quote": "LibreOffice and Collarbora don't seem to be there yet", "excerpt": "Serious question: what's your preferred alternative to SharePoint? We have an eclectic portemonteau of software, bookstack for docs, outlook and ms-365 for office etc. We're not a software company, think more mercantile and manufacture. We have a lot of stuff in excel, price calc, processes etc. I don't see a way away from excel. Currently we have all xls files on network drives, which is hard to maintain. Even thoug", "context": "works at a non-software mercantile and manufacturing company", "use_case": "office suite alternative", "switched_from": "", "story": "Microsoft Teams is a red flag"}]}], "praise": [{"label": "Real daily work", "summary": "Long-time users rely on Writer and Calc for business, legal, accounting and personal finance tasks.", "quotes": [{"id": 793775904, "item_id": 49610994, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49610994", "by": "rietta", "date": "2026-09-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It is my real office suite I use for real work and real business accounting tasks.", "excerpt": "This is awesome! I have used LibreOffice (and Open Office) extensively for decades now. It is my real office suite I use for real work and real business accounting tasks. Yes, I am very well aware that Calc is different than Excel but it can get nearly all the same tasks done as long as you are not tied deep into a corporate environment passing Excel-specific files around. I have also made great business uses of it i", "context": "donates $19/month to the foundation", "use_case": "office work, accounting, PDF generation", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice breaks download records after declaring it has no AI features"}, {"id": 791224608, "item_id": 49451538, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49451538", "by": "Night_Thastus", "date": "2026-08-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I am very grateful for LibreOffice. Writer and Calc got me through college", "excerpt": "I am very grateful for LibreOffice. Writer and Calc got me through college, and I use Calc on a nearly daily basis for keeping track of finances. Years ago they felt unpolished and a bit pet-project-y, but now they feel like proper tools that stand up well. I think for the business scene Excel will remain dominant for shear backwards compatibility, but for typical users there's no reason not to use it.", "context": "", "use_case": "documents and finances spreadsheets", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice 26.8 Released with Many Nice Improvements"}, {"id": 791221360, "item_id": 49451335, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49451335", "by": "2Gkashmiri", "date": "2026-08-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use it as my day tool as a lawyer,  I use writer and calc alongside office tools", "excerpt": "I have been extensively using LibreOffice alongside office 2019 (using Massgrave) And it is converging more and more. I use it as my day tool as a lawyer, I use writer and calc alongside office tools and i see formatting issues coming less and less. This is after me using it day for 3-4 years daily. Every update makes improvements. Sure its \"slow\" at features but I'm not interested in \"ai\" features so it's fine. It i", "context": "lawyer", "use_case": "daily legal document work", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice 26.8 Released with Many Nice Improvements"}]}, {"label": "Linux desktop", "summary": "It is the go-to office suite when moving to or living on Linux.", "quotes": [{"id": 800759984, "item_id": 50047499, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50047499", "by": "sombragris", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "And it works really well. I can use it and exchange documents with people using Word without problem", "excerpt": "Lawyer, translator and professor here. I have an Office 365 subscription and I got native Word and other MS Office apps installed on my windows partition. But, since I use Linux on the desktop, and MS chose not to offer their office suite as Linux native apps, and they make it near impossible to use the Windows apps under Wine, I use LibreOffice. And it works really well. I can use it and exchange documents with peop", "context": "lawyer, translator and professor; Linux desktop user", "use_case": "office suite on Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Open-source Microsoft Excel, PowerPoint, and Word replications"}, {"id": 793800672, "item_id": 49612542, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49612542", "by": "p2detar", "date": "2026-09-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I installed LibreOffice on my parents' PC last month", "excerpt": "I don't buy the AI argument. I'd bet on Linux replacing Windows for a good chunk of desktop users. For example, I installed LibreOffice on my parents' PC last month, because I replaced their Windows with Linux Mint.", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite for parents", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice breaks download records after declaring it has no AI features"}, {"id": 748819840, "item_id": 46801240, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46801240", "by": "dismalaf", "date": "2026-01-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I found LibreOffice and Ubuntu.", "excerpt": "I switched to Linux circa 2010 when I needed a word processor but didn't want to go to the store to buy Office (was pretty young and poor at the time). After some Googling I found LibreOffice and Ubuntu. I had used Suse Linux years earlier when I was a kid but it definitely wasn't ready for use (2003) so I was also curious about Ubuntu and the current state at the time. I installed Ubuntu, used LibreOffice for the th", "context": "Linux user since 2010", "use_case": "word processing", "switched_from": "Microsoft Office", "story": "Microsoft forced me to switch to Linux"}]}, {"label": "Free and private", "summary": "Valued as free, subscription-free and fully local, with no AI features or data exfiltration.", "quotes": [{"id": 732568720, "item_id": 45785545, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45785545", "by": "jrepinc", "date": "2025-11-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "That's why I switched to LibreOffice, no \"AI\" crap and full local and respecting privacy.", "excerpt": "That's why I switched to LibreOffice, no \"AI\" crap and full local and respecting privacy. https://www.libreoffice.org/", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "Microsoft Office", "story": "You can't turn off Copilot in the web versions of Word, Excel, or PowerPoint"}, {"id": 791237808, "item_id": 49452363, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49452363", "by": "olivierestsage", "date": "2026-08-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "now I see a big new use case for people wanting to avoid LLM integrations/data exfiltration. I wish them much success!", "excerpt": "I used to think LibreOffice was too far behind the times to be relevant, but now I see a big new use case for people wanting to avoid LLM integrations/data exfiltration. I wish them much success!", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite without AI", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice 26.8 Released with Many Nice Improvements"}, {"id": 733377392, "item_id": 45836087, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45836087", "by": "k310", "date": "2025-11-06", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "May I recommend Libre Office? [0] For casual/home use, it should meet needs. Free, no subscription.", "excerpt": "May I recommend Libre Office? [0] For casual/home use, it should meet needs. Free, no subscription. Spreadsheet can collaborate. [1] Collabra Office seems to be the port of LibreOffice to ios. (free) Look it up on the app store. > Collabora Office is a text editor, spreadsheet and presentation program based on LibreOffice, the world's most popular Open Source office suite - and now it's on iOS, enhancing your possibi", "context": "", "use_case": "casual home office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "Refund requests flood Microsoft after tricking users into AI upgrades"}]}, {"label": "Office compatibility", "summary": "Users report exchanging documents with MS Office users for years with few problems.", "quotes": [{"id": 800747872, "item_id": 50046742, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50046742", "by": "Emoticon4032", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "We have been using LibreOffice in our company for 20+ years, exchanging files with customers and vendors who use MS Office in all its versions during this time. We never had a problem\u2026", "excerpt": "Just curious\u2026 why do you think that? We have been using LibreOffice in our company for 20+ years, exchanging files with customers and vendors who use MS Office in all its versions during this time. We never had a problem\u2026", "context": "company using it for 20+ years", "use_case": "company office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "Open-source Microsoft Excel, PowerPoint, and Word replications"}, {"id": 800759984, "item_id": 50047499, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50047499", "by": "sombragris", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "And it works really well. I can use it and exchange documents with people using Word without problem", "excerpt": "Lawyer, translator and professor here. I have an Office 365 subscription and I got native Word and other MS Office apps installed on my windows partition. But, since I use Linux on the desktop, and MS chose not to offer their office suite as Linux native apps, and they make it near impossible to use the Windows apps under Wine, I use LibreOffice. And it works really well. I can use it and exchange documents with peop", "context": "lawyer, translator and professor; Linux desktop user", "use_case": "office suite on Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Open-source Microsoft Excel, PowerPoint, and Word replications"}, {"id": 753149729, "item_id": 47071858, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47071858", "by": "m-i-l", "date": "2026-02-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "they open just fine in LibreOffice with formatting and everything preserved", "excerpt": "I used ST Writer which came bundled with my ST. I still have all my ST Writer files (last modified in 1993!), and quite impressively they open just fine in LibreOffice with formatting and everything preserved (unlike some later .doc files I have).", "context": "", "use_case": "opening old documents", "switched_from": "", "story": "A word processor from 1990s for Atari ST/TOS is still supported by enthusiasts"}]}, {"label": "Classic menu UI", "summary": "Some prefer its traditional menubar layout over Microsoft's ribbon.", "quotes": [{"id": 750461184, "item_id": 46903824, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46903824", "by": "realityfactchex", "date": "2026-02-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love LibreOffice very much as the last bastion of sanity in classic document suites", "excerpt": "First of all, I love LibreOffice very much as the last bastion of sanity in classic document suites, and I and love what Collabora is trying to do with the online piece. So, first, a million thanks. Truly. Now, to put on the the \"feedback is a gift\" and \"radical transparency\" caps. From the screenshot comparison in TFA: The new one looks all Microsoft-Ribbony. That's a huge step backward. The big strength of LibreOff", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "The New Collabora Office for Desktop"}, {"id": 800759984, "item_id": 50047499, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50047499", "by": "sombragris", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "And it works really well. I can use it and exchange documents with people using Word without problem", "excerpt": "Lawyer, translator and professor here. I have an Office 365 subscription and I got native Word and other MS Office apps installed on my windows partition. But, since I use Linux on the desktop, and MS chose not to offer their office suite as Linux native apps, and they make it near impossible to use the Windows apps under Wine, I use LibreOffice. And it works really well. I can use it and exchange documents with peop", "context": "lawyer, translator and professor; Linux desktop user", "use_case": "office suite on Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Open-source Microsoft Excel, PowerPoint, and Word replications"}, {"id": 793526704, "item_id": 49595419, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49595419", "by": "3RTB297", "date": "2026-09-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "LibreOffice has UI plugins that arrange everything in a standard Office pre-365 layout. I've been using it for years and I can't recall a single time I've ran into any issues.", "excerpt": "Office is very much not a problem. LibreOffice has UI plugins that arrange everything in a standard Office pre-365 layout. I've been using it for years and I can't recall a single time I've ran into any issues. I think Excel macros are where the start of dealbreakers begin, which is a niche issue. 90+% of Office users won't hit that wall. Second, the EU has been pouring money into an OpenOffice fork for official use ", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "Switzerland's Federal Government Is Replacing Microsoft on 3k Computers"}]}, {"label": "Own Mac dialogs", "summary": "Mac users like that it can replace macOS's native save dialog with its own.", "quotes": [{"id": 767176864, "item_id": 47948554, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47948554", "by": "anonthrownaway", "date": "2026-04-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use LibreOffice on Mac mostly because it allows me to use their dialogs", "excerpt": ">The only difference is that the menus, dialogs, file pickers, keyboard shortcuts, and windowing all use native macOS Cocoa APIs. Why would I want native macOS dialogs where the save as dialog can only show 32 characters on the screen at once? I use LibreOffice on Mac mostly because it allows me to use their dialogs instead of the crap macOS ones...", "context": "Mac user", "use_case": "office suite on Mac", "switched_from": "", "story": "Notepad++ Code Editor Comes to Mac After 20-Year Wait"}, {"id": 766744320, "item_id": 47921520, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47921520", "by": "anonthrownaway", "date": "2026-04-27", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I am in LibreOffice, which lets me disable the native save as dialog box and use the works as expected LibreOffice one.", "excerpt": "Amazing HW. SW that is stunningly bad. My example that makes me want to divest myself from my all-in on Apple's ecosystem: Native save as dialog box with a filename text box that shows (at most) 32 characters on the screen at once. Even with the smallest dialog box width possible, there is room to make the filename more than 64 characters. Resizing the box does nothing. They can't be eating their own dogfood here rig", "context": "", "use_case": "document editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tim Cook Is Leaving. Good"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "Dated, clunky UI", "summary": "Several find the interface clunky, confusing or old-looking.", "quotes": [{"id": 760472304, "item_id": 47529519, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47529519", "by": "smcleod", "date": "2026-03-26", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Libreoffice just feels so clunky and Java-ish to use.", "excerpt": "Not related to donations but product wise Libreoffice just feels so clunky and Java-ish to use. I switched to OnlyOffice a year ago and other than its almost complete lack of settings it's been so much nicer to use.", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice and the Art of Overreacting"}, {"id": 753589600, "item_id": 47099350, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47099350", "by": "Flavius", "date": "2026-02-21", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It looks ancient, worse than office apps from 20 years ago.", "excerpt": "Take a look at these screenshots: https://libreoffice.en.uptodown.com/mac It looks ancient, worse than office apps from 20 years ago.", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite UI", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice blasts OnlyOffice for working with Microsoft to lock users in"}, {"id": 785621024, "item_id": 49101314, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49101314", "by": "fluidcruft", "date": "2026-07-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "LibreOffice's menus are a confusing maze (even when switched into the more ribbon-like mode).", "excerpt": "People say that and I used to agree, but honestly I use neither MS Office nor LibreOffice heavily anymore. Nowadays I can figure out what to do in MS Office very quickly but LibreOffice's menus are a confusing maze (even when switched into the more ribbon-like mode).", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "KOReader"}]}, {"label": "Excel gap", "summary": "Calc differs from Excel, and Excel-specific files and macros can be a dealbreaker.", "quotes": [{"id": 735457810, "item_id": 45966113, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45966113", "by": "edferda", "date": "2025-11-18", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Libre office spreadsheets are terrible when compared to Excel.", "excerpt": "I\u2019ve been using Windows my entire life. In the past, I tried Linux without much success, switching back within a few weeks. However, Microsoft\u2019s software is just beyond bad these days. Simple actions take seconds, the UI/UX feels designed to make you waste time, and the fundamentals of what an OS should do feel broken. It\u2019s hard to overstate how bad quality has gotten. This motivated me to move to Linux and installed", "context": "lifelong Windows user, uses Windows at work", "use_case": "spreadsheets", "switched_from": "", "story": "Windows 11 adds AI agent that runs in background with access to personal folders"}, {"id": 793775904, "item_id": 49610994, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49610994", "by": "rietta", "date": "2026-09-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It is my real office suite I use for real work and real business accounting tasks.", "excerpt": "This is awesome! I have used LibreOffice (and Open Office) extensively for decades now. It is my real office suite I use for real work and real business accounting tasks. Yes, I am very well aware that Calc is different than Excel but it can get nearly all the same tasks done as long as you are not tied deep into a corporate environment passing Excel-specific files around. I have also made great business uses of it i", "context": "donates $19/month to the foundation", "use_case": "office work, accounting, PDF generation", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice breaks download records after declaring it has no AI features"}, {"id": 793526704, "item_id": 49595419, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49595419", "by": "3RTB297", "date": "2026-09-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "LibreOffice has UI plugins that arrange everything in a standard Office pre-365 layout. I've been using it for years and I can't recall a single time I've ran into any issues.", "excerpt": "Office is very much not a problem. LibreOffice has UI plugins that arrange everything in a standard Office pre-365 layout. I've been using it for years and I can't recall a single time I've ran into any issues. I think Excel macros are where the start of dealbreakers begin, which is a niche issue. 90+% of Office users won't hit that wall. Second, the EU has been pouring money into an OpenOffice fork for official use ", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "Switzerland's Federal Government Is Replacing Microsoft on 3k Computers"}]}, {"label": "Collaboration", "summary": "Shared editing and document sharing lag behind Microsoft's integrated tools.", "quotes": [{"id": 802215602, "item_id": 50138475, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50138475", "by": "remuskaos", "date": "2026-10-18", "stance": "warn", "quote": "LibreOffice and Collabora don't seem to be there yet.", "excerpt": "Same question I've had in the other comment. What is your preferred alternative to SharePoint? Because we do need document sharing, and I don't see a viable way away from Excel for us. Right now we're sharing Excel files on network drives, which is horrible for versioning files, so I'd rather prefer something like SharePoint, but not from Microsoft. LibreOffice and Collabora don't seem to be there yet. Personally, I ", "context": "company entrenched in Excel", "use_case": "Excel alternative", "switched_from": "", "story": "Microsoft Teams is a red flag"}, {"id": 802214259, "item_id": 50138391, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50138391", "by": "remuskaos", "date": "2026-10-18", "stance": "warn", "quote": "LibreOffice and Collarbora don't seem to be there yet", "excerpt": "Serious question: what's your preferred alternative to SharePoint? We have an eclectic portemonteau of software, bookstack for docs, outlook and ms-365 for office etc. We're not a software company, think more mercantile and manufacture. We have a lot of stuff in excel, price calc, processes etc. I don't see a way away from excel. Currently we have all xls files on network drives, which is hard to maintain. Even thoug", "context": "works at a non-software mercantile and manufacturing company", "use_case": "office suite alternative", "switched_from": "", "story": "Microsoft Teams is a red flag"}, {"id": 791221360, "item_id": 49451335, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49451335", "by": "2Gkashmiri", "date": "2026-08-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use it as my day tool as a lawyer,  I use writer and calc alongside office tools", "excerpt": "I have been extensively using LibreOffice alongside office 2019 (using Massgrave) And it is converging more and more. I use it as my day tool as a lawyer, I use writer and calc alongside office tools and i see formatting issues coming less and less. This is after me using it day for 3-4 years daily. Every update makes improvements. Sure its \"slow\" at features but I'm not interested in \"ai\" features so it's fine. It i", "context": "lawyer", "use_case": "daily legal document work", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice 26.8 Released with Many Nice Improvements"}]}, {"label": "Heavy and slow", "summary": "Some see it as a slow behemoth compared with lighter suites like OnlyOffice.", "quotes": [{"id": 753604001, "item_id": 47100250, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47100250", "by": "dizhn", "date": "2026-02-21", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I don't like any of the libreoffice/openoffice behemoths.", "excerpt": "I don't like any of the libreoffice/openoffice behemoths. I only ever used them because there wasn't anything better/comperable, so I will stay away from that discussion. I like OnlyOffice. Their desktop apps are much lighter and better looking. They work fine for my light needs. They also do have a LOT more than just desktop apps. The last time I mentioned them I was informed they are Russian. If that matters to you", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice blasts OnlyOffice for working with Microsoft to lock users in"}, {"id": 750444337, "item_id": 46902771, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46902771", "by": "dizhn", "date": "2026-02-05", "stance": "compare", "quote": "Probably faster than LibreOffice if it's still like the last time I used it", "excerpt": "I have super light office requirements these days and those are satisfied with OnlyOffice (https://www.onlyoffice.com/). I do believe it's an Electron app but works quite fast in my personal experience. (Probably faster than LibreOffice if it's still like the last time I used it). It's open source: https://github.com/ONLYOFFICE/ I hadn't looked at the Github page in a while. They seem to have a ton of new features on", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "The New Collabora Office for Desktop"}]}, {"label": "Styles and typesetting", "summary": "One user found getting styles and formatting right painful for typesetting.", "quotes": [{"id": 791856145, "item_id": 49491009, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49491009", "by": "tnelsond4", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "it being a pain to get the styles and formatting right", "excerpt": "After trying to use libreoffice for typesetting and it being a pain to get the styles and formatting right I switched to Typst. Pretty impressed by it's Khmer language support. A lot lighter than latex or sile.", "context": "", "use_case": "typesetting", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice 26.8 is out \u2013 local first, and with no AI"}]}, {"label": "Retraining cost", "summary": "One business avoids it because of the cost of retraining staff used to Microsoft Office.", "quotes": [{"id": 783636897, "item_id": 48977306, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48977306", "by": "daft_pink", "date": "2026-07-20", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "", "excerpt": "I feel they are pushing their own narrative without really having any evidence. We use Microsoft at work because we would either use Microsoft or Google for email. The email service is critical to the choice. We can\u2019t run our own reliably and other vendors just don\u2019t interoperate the same way. Microsoft Office simply isn\u2019t that expensive and it\u2019s very easy to hire people who know how to use it and are comfortable wit", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "How proprietary formats have become Microsoft\u2019s main tool for lock-in"}]}], "who": [{"by": "encom", "context": "public sector worker in Denmark", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50225725", "date": "2026-10-24"}, {"by": "sombragris", "context": "lawyer, translator and professor; Linux desktop user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50047499", "date": "2026-10-11"}, {"by": "Emoticon4032", "context": "company using it for 20+ years", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50046742", "date": "2026-10-11"}, {"by": "chrismorgan", "context": "Linux user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49820892", "date": "2026-09-23"}, {"by": "rietta", "context": "donates $19/month to the foundation", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49610994", "date": "2026-09-08"}, {"by": "flaburgan", "context": "Linux user, tech go-to person for family", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49563930", "date": "2026-09-04"}, {"by": "johnsmith1840", "context": "built an AI system", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49530286", "date": "2026-09-02"}, {"by": "2Gkashmiri", "context": "lawyer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49451335", "date": "2026-08-26"}, {"by": "notabotiswear", "context": "Arabic speaker", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49450872", "date": "2026-08-26"}, {"by": "anonthrownaway", "context": "Mac user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47948554", "date": "2026-04-29"}, {"by": "contingencies", "context": "deals with lawyers and investors", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47652966", "date": "2026-04-05"}, {"by": "sailorganymede", "context": "donor", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47531376", "date": "2026-03-26"}], "tags": ["for Linux users", "for home use", "for avoiding AI features", "for legal work", "for document automation"], "use_cases": ["office suite", "office documents", "spreadsheets", "desktop office suite", "excel alternative", "office suite alternative"], "compared": [{"slug": "microsoft-office", "name": "Microsoft Office", "co": 16, "switched_from": 5, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "onlyoffice", "name": "OnlyOffice", "co": 7, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 2}, {"slug": "microsoft-excel", "name": "Microsoft Excel", "co": 7, "switched_from": 1, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "openoffice", "name": "OpenOffice", "co": 3, "switched_from": 1, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "google-docs", "name": "Google Docs", "co": 5, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "firefox", "name": "Firefox", "co": 4, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "latex", "name": "LaTeX", "co": 2, "switched_from": 1, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [{"id": 754462928, "item_id": 47153933, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47153933", "by": "buovjaga", "date": "2026-02-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "At The Document Foundation we are always interested in helping deployments.", "excerpt": "LibreOffice release builds should offer to send a crash report. Ideally, you should then create a bug report referencing the crash report. Besides that, you can do your own build with debug symbols and get backtraces or debug the program. At The Document Foundation we are always interested in helping deployments. It is also nice to do writeups for our blog. Let me know, if your organisation needs help: ilmari.lauhaka", "context": "works at The Document Foundation", "use_case": "office suite deployments", "switched_from": "", "story": "Danish Gov agency to ditch Microsoft software in push for digital independence"}], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49610538", "title": "LibreOffice breaks download records after declaring it has no AI features", "mentions": 5}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49447724", "title": "LibreOffice 26.8 Released with Many Nice Improvements", "mentions": 4}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47528605", "title": "LibreOffice and the Art of Overreacting", "mentions": 4}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46899591", "title": "The New Collabora Office for Desktop", "mentions": 4}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50130228", "title": "Microsoft Teams is a red flag", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50043110", "title": "Open-source Microsoft Excel, PowerPoint, and Word replications", "mentions": 2}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"recommend": 2, "compare": 1, "warn": 2}, "2025-12": {"compare": 1}, "2026-01": {"recommend": 3}, "2026-02": {"recommend": 5, "compare": 1, "neutral": 1, "warn": 1}, "2026-03": {"recommend": 2, "warn": 1, "neutral": 1}, "2026-04": {"compare": 1, "recommend": 3}, "2026-05": {"recommend": 2}, "2026-06": {"recommend": 3}, "2026-07": {"neutral": 2, "warn": 1}, "2026-08": {"recommend": 5, "neutral": 1, "warn": 1}, "2026-09": {"recommend": 10, "compare": 1, "neutral": 1}, "2026-10": {"recommend": 3, "warn": 1}}, "quotes": [{"id": 803611601, "item_id": 50225725, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50225725", "by": "encom", "date": "2026-10-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've installed Linux+LibreOffice on a spare machine at work that I use occasionally, to keep from tearing my hair out.", "excerpt": "I work in the public sector in Denmark. Office 365 is the bane of my work day. I only have access to the web versions of the apps, but they feel like toys. It seems impossible to do anything even moderately complex with them. Especially form design. I've installed Linux+LibreOffice on a spare machine at work that I use occasionally, to keep from tearing my hair out. As much as I despise Microsoft, I admit that their ", "context": "public sector worker in Denmark", "use_case": "office documents", "switched_from": "Office 365", "story": "Danish Government silently drops plan to dump MS Office"}, {"id": 802215602, "item_id": 50138475, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50138475", "by": "remuskaos", "date": "2026-10-18", "stance": "warn", "quote": "LibreOffice and Collabora don't seem to be there yet.", "excerpt": "Same question I've had in the other comment. What is your preferred alternative to SharePoint? Because we do need document sharing, and I don't see a viable way away from Excel for us. Right now we're sharing Excel files on network drives, which is horrible for versioning files, so I'd rather prefer something like SharePoint, but not from Microsoft. LibreOffice and Collabora don't seem to be there yet. Personally, I ", "context": "company entrenched in Excel", "use_case": "Excel alternative", "switched_from": "", "story": "Microsoft Teams is a red flag"}, {"id": 802214259, "item_id": 50138391, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50138391", "by": "remuskaos", "date": "2026-10-18", "stance": "warn", "quote": "LibreOffice and Collarbora don't seem to be there yet", "excerpt": "Serious question: what's your preferred alternative to SharePoint? We have an eclectic portemonteau of software, bookstack for docs, outlook and ms-365 for office etc. We're not a software company, think more mercantile and manufacture. We have a lot of stuff in excel, price calc, processes etc. I don't see a way away from excel. Currently we have all xls files on network drives, which is hard to maintain. Even thoug", "context": "works at a non-software mercantile and manufacturing company", "use_case": "office suite alternative", "switched_from": "", "story": "Microsoft Teams is a red flag"}, {"id": 800759984, "item_id": 50047499, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50047499", "by": "sombragris", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "And it works really well. I can use it and exchange documents with people using Word without problem", "excerpt": "Lawyer, translator and professor here. I have an Office 365 subscription and I got native Word and other MS Office apps installed on my windows partition. But, since I use Linux on the desktop, and MS chose not to offer their office suite as Linux native apps, and they make it near impossible to use the Windows apps under Wine, I use LibreOffice. And it works really well. I can use it and exchange documents with peop", "context": "lawyer, translator and professor; Linux desktop user", "use_case": "office suite on Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Open-source Microsoft Excel, PowerPoint, and Word replications"}, {"id": 800747872, "item_id": 50046742, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50046742", "by": "Emoticon4032", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "We have been using LibreOffice in our company for 20+ years, exchanging files with customers and vendors who use MS Office in all its versions during this time. We never had a problem\u2026", "excerpt": "Just curious\u2026 why do you think that? We have been using LibreOffice in our company for 20+ years, exchanging files with customers and vendors who use MS Office in all its versions during this time. We never had a problem\u2026", "context": "company using it for 20+ years", "use_case": "company office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "Open-source Microsoft Excel, PowerPoint, and Word replications"}, {"id": 797667905, "item_id": 49854244, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49854244", "by": "dreamcompiler", "date": "2026-09-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Libre Office is available and I'm switching to Linux anyway", "excerpt": "I used to say Excel was the only truly useful, well-designed piece of software Microsoft ever made. It's an amazing example of dataflow programming and for that reason alone it's worthy of study. Alas, Microsoft has enshittified it. Excel used to be a standalone program, then they made it online with the offline version hard to find. I bought that offline version only to discover it would stop working if it didn't ph", "context": "", "use_case": "spreadsheets", "switched_from": "Excel", "story": "Excel now supports multiple values in a single cell"}, {"id": 797134273, "item_id": 49820892, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49820892", "by": "chrismorgan", "date": "2026-09-23", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "scrolls at a fixed slow pace while the button is held in LibreOffice", "excerpt": "In Linux/GTK, clicking in the gutter navigates to that position, and I have just discovered that Shift+clicking is equivalent to PageUp/PageDown, and that right-clicking seems to also be equivalent to PageUp/PageDown in Firefox, but scrolls at a fixed slow pace while the button is held in LibreOffice (15s per screenful at 6fps in Writer) and Inkscape (3s per screenful, smooth), and that middle-clicking is mostly Page", "context": "Linux user", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "A brief history of Windows scroll bar shortcuts"}, {"id": 795666049, "item_id": 49729128, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49729128", "by": "Leftium", "date": "2026-09-16", "stance": "compare", "quote": "Gimp and LibreOffice are alternatives to adobe/office. Yet most people prefer the paid options.", "excerpt": "I think the real question you're asking is: why isn't AI coded software replacing well-known incumbent software (office, adobe, etc...) Because I see AI coded software everywhere: HN has been complaining about the recent influx of Show HNs due to AI. Take a specific product category: there are about two new dictation apps on Show HN every week. Here are my theories: - adobe/office are simply too complex for AI to rep", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Where is all of the AI coded software?"}, {"id": 795446736, "item_id": 49715421, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49715421", "by": "bigyabai", "date": "2026-09-15", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Between Libreoffice and Google Docs, I haven't touched MS365 products in almost a decade now.", "excerpt": "Microsoft Office and Adobe products had FOSS alternatives before AI ever existed. Between Libreoffice and Google Docs, I haven't touched MS365 products in almost a decade now. The problem is usually a licensing/compliance/support one. Everyone hates Photoshop and Lightroom, but it's what all of the professional plugins support. Nobody likes paying for Microsoft Word, but it supports Active Directory and the weird doc", "context": "", "use_case": "office documents", "switched_from": "Microsoft 365", "story": "Ask HN: Where is all of the AI coded software?"}, {"id": 793841856, "item_id": 49615116, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49615116", "by": "secretsatan", "date": "2026-09-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I switched to LibreOffice just recently", "excerpt": "I switched to LibreOffice just recently, but only because i\u2019d been happy with OpenOffice for years and only recently decided to see if there was an update and found out it had been discontinued in 2011. It was still working fine for me tbh, but i thought better to update to something newer.", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "OpenOffice", "story": "LibreOffice breaks download records after declaring it has no AI features"}, {"id": 793800672, "item_id": 49612542, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49612542", "by": "p2detar", "date": "2026-09-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I installed LibreOffice on my parents' PC last month", "excerpt": "I don't buy the AI argument. I'd bet on Linux replacing Windows for a good chunk of desktop users. For example, I installed LibreOffice on my parents' PC last month, because I replaced their Windows with Linux Mint.", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite for parents", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice breaks download records after declaring it has no AI features"}, {"id": 793781072, "item_id": 49611317, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49611317", "by": "Topgamer7", "date": "2026-09-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Been using libreoffice for years.", "excerpt": "Been using libreoffice for years. Here's hoping increased usage will lead to improvements in the \"table\" functionality. Like when you can define a table, and hit tab at the last column will put you at the next row first column. Missed that from MS office.", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice breaks download records after declaring it has no AI features"}, {"id": 793775904, "item_id": 49610994, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49610994", "by": "rietta", "date": "2026-09-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It is my real office suite I use for real work and real business accounting tasks.", "excerpt": "This is awesome! I have used LibreOffice (and Open Office) extensively for decades now. It is my real office suite I use for real work and real business accounting tasks. Yes, I am very well aware that Calc is different than Excel but it can get nearly all the same tasks done as long as you are not tied deep into a corporate environment passing Excel-specific files around. I have also made great business uses of it i", "context": "donates $19/month to the foundation", "use_case": "office work, accounting, PDF generation", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice breaks download records after declaring it has no AI features"}, {"id": 793770736, "item_id": 49610671, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49610671", "by": "firefax", "date": "2026-09-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It's a great project that doesn't get enough love.", "excerpt": "I've been using Libreoffice to store my diary for years -- IIRC they use blowfish on the crypto side of things? I had a weird issue a while back where I'm not sure if I forgot my diary's password, or the file got corrupted. I've had that happen a few times, each with a long space in between I keep things on paper. It's a great project that doesn't get enough love.", "context": "", "use_case": "storing an encrypted diary", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice breaks download records after declaring it has no AI features"}, {"id": 793526704, "item_id": 49595419, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49595419", "by": "3RTB297", "date": "2026-09-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "LibreOffice has UI plugins that arrange everything in a standard Office pre-365 layout. I've been using it for years and I can't recall a single time I've ran into any issues.", "excerpt": "Office is very much not a problem. LibreOffice has UI plugins that arrange everything in a standard Office pre-365 layout. I've been using it for years and I can't recall a single time I've ran into any issues. I think Excel macros are where the start of dealbreakers begin, which is a niche issue. 90+% of Office users won't hit that wall. Second, the EU has been pouring money into an OpenOffice fork for official use ", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "Switzerland's Federal Government Is Replacing Microsoft on 3k Computers"}, {"id": 793022882, "item_id": 49563930, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49563930", "by": "flaburgan", "date": "2026-09-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "put as many free software as I can (Firefox, Thunderbird, LibreOffice, VLC, Gimp...)", "excerpt": "I removed my dual boot in 2009, so the last windows I used on a personal computer was Vista. I switched my close family (parents and even my grand mother) to Linux years ago, nevertheless I still am the tech-savyy go-to person for other people and I am completely disconnected from what's going on the Windows world. Is an antivirus still needed there? Are there some good tools that should always be installed on a comp", "context": "Linux user, tech go-to person for family", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "O&O ShutUp10 \u2013 The antispy tool for Windows 10 and 11"}, {"id": 792484576, "item_id": 49530286, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49530286", "by": "johnsmith1840", "date": "2026-09-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "in the end libre was the only thing even somewhat functional", "excerpt": "If you've ever actually gone down this route you will try exactly this realize how much of a cluster f these products are and just use libre. I did the exact same thing in my AI system. Spent an ENOURMOUS amount of time trying everything I could and in the end libre was the only thing even somewhat functional. Easily 2 months of my life lost to these god forsaken systems. APIs and CLIs sound reasonable until you actu", "context": "built an AI system", "use_case": "document handling in AI system", "switched_from": "", "story": "The ChatGPT/Codex app bundles a full copy of LibreOffice"}, {"id": 791856145, "item_id": 49491009, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49491009", "by": "tnelsond4", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "it being a pain to get the styles and formatting right", "excerpt": "After trying to use libreoffice for typesetting and it being a pain to get the styles and formatting right I switched to Typst. Pretty impressed by it's Khmer language support. A lot lighter than latex or sile.", "context": "", "use_case": "typesetting", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice 26.8 is out \u2013 local first, and with no AI"}, {"id": 791237808, "item_id": 49452363, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49452363", "by": "olivierestsage", "date": "2026-08-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "now I see a big new use case for people wanting to avoid LLM integrations/data exfiltration. I wish them much success!", "excerpt": "I used to think LibreOffice was too far behind the times to be relevant, but now I see a big new use case for people wanting to avoid LLM integrations/data exfiltration. I wish them much success!", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite without AI", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice 26.8 Released with Many Nice Improvements"}, {"id": 791224608, "item_id": 49451538, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49451538", "by": "Night_Thastus", "date": "2026-08-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I am very grateful for LibreOffice. Writer and Calc got me through college", "excerpt": "I am very grateful for LibreOffice. Writer and Calc got me through college, and I use Calc on a nearly daily basis for keeping track of finances. Years ago they felt unpolished and a bit pet-project-y, but now they feel like proper tools that stand up well. I think for the business scene Excel will remain dominant for shear backwards compatibility, but for typical users there's no reason not to use it.", "context": "", "use_case": "documents and finances spreadsheets", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice 26.8 Released with Many Nice Improvements"}, {"id": 791221360, "item_id": 49451335, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49451335", "by": "2Gkashmiri", "date": "2026-08-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use it as my day tool as a lawyer,  I use writer and calc alongside office tools", "excerpt": "I have been extensively using LibreOffice alongside office 2019 (using Massgrave) And it is converging more and more. I use it as my day tool as a lawyer, I use writer and calc alongside office tools and i see formatting issues coming less and less. This is after me using it day for 3-4 years daily. Every update makes improvements. Sure its \"slow\" at features but I'm not interested in \"ai\" features so it's fine. It i", "context": "lawyer", "use_case": "daily legal document work", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice 26.8 Released with Many Nice Improvements"}, {"id": 791213952, "item_id": 49450872, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49450872", "by": "notabotiswear", "date": "2026-08-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love LO and I appreciate the love they are giving to Arabic speakers", "excerpt": "I love LO and I appreciate the love they are giving to Arabic speakers, but that \"\u0645\u062a\u0627\u0644\" is killing me!", "context": "Arabic speaker", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice 26.8 Released with Many Nice Improvements"}, {"id": 787503457, "item_id": 49218966, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49218966", "by": "robomartin", "date": "2026-08-07", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Let's just take one: LibreOffice.", "excerpt": "None of these things are free my friend. They probably represent tens of billions of dollars in development over years, decades in some cases. You are missing the point entirely. Let's just take one: LibreOffice. This was a FOSS project from the very start. It is intended to be used as you use it. Even then, bitching about functionality and features would be entitled. In that case, if you don't like it, stop using it", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Improving GPT-5.6 Sol in ChatGPT\u2014and expanding access for free users"}, {"id": 787493186, "item_id": 49218324, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49218324", "by": "ragequittah", "date": "2026-08-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Most of the stuff I use is free and excellent.", "excerpt": "Most of the stuff I use is free and excellent. Linux, Firefox, libreoffice, xcp-ng, bottles, steam, playnite, opnsense, docker, dockhand, immich, freshrss, obsidian, tailscale, calibre, caddy, docker, pi-hole, signal, audiobookshelf I could probably keep going for a long while. I'm very glad most good software creators I've come across do not have your mindset.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Improving GPT-5.6 Sol in ChatGPT\u2014and expanding access for free users"}, {"id": 785621024, "item_id": 49101314, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49101314", "by": "fluidcruft", "date": "2026-07-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "LibreOffice's menus are a confusing maze (even when switched into the more ribbon-like mode).", "excerpt": "People say that and I used to agree, but honestly I use neither MS Office nor LibreOffice heavily anymore. Nowadays I can figure out what to do in MS Office very quickly but LibreOffice's menus are a confusing maze (even when switched into the more ribbon-like mode).", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "KOReader"}, {"id": 783636897, "item_id": 48977306, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48977306", "by": "daft_pink", "date": "2026-07-20", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "", "excerpt": "I feel they are pushing their own narrative without really having any evidence. We use Microsoft at work because we would either use Microsoft or Google for email. The email service is critical to the choice. We can\u2019t run our own reliably and other vendors just don\u2019t interoperate the same way. Microsoft Office simply isn\u2019t that expensive and it\u2019s very easy to hire people who know how to use it and are comfortable wit", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "How proprietary formats have become Microsoft\u2019s main tool for lock-in"}, {"id": 782260337, "item_id": 48891271, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48891271", "by": "fishbone", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "rasterize the docx file with LibreOffice and take another screenshot", "excerpt": "Hey HN, author here. I do a lot of backend document (docx file) generation work, and updating our templates and backend code is one of my least favorite development tasks. Cryptic errors, minute-plus rebuild loops. I\u2019d much prefer building these reports in JS rendered HTML (e.g., Vue or React), but existing HTML-to-docx libraries in the OSS ecosystem don't produce output that's actually valid, editable Word structure", "context": "", "use_case": "rendering docx for scoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: DOM-docx \u2013 HTML to native, editable Word docs (MIT)"}, {"id": 778345636, "item_id": 48646602, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48646602", "by": "k310", "date": "2026-06-23", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Ones I actually use.", "excerpt": "Ublock-origin with Firefox, Audacity, Batch Photo Resizer, calibre, cardflow, Diffraction, Ejimo and Ultra Character Map (try finding emojis without them), Libre Office, Paprika Recipe Manager, Samurai Safe, SeaMonkey (who else edits HTML?) GIMP, Darktable, RawTherapee, Super Photo Upscaler, Sublime Text, VLC, Clearview (and why isn't epub supported natively?), PhotoSync (share photos with all platforms), GhostText f", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: New clean macOS install. Must-have apps? Best browser?"}, {"id": 778331113, "item_id": 48645694, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48645694", "by": "unmanageduck", "date": "2026-06-23", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Office suite: LibreOffice", "excerpt": "Package manager: Nix(alternative to homebrew) https://nixos.org/download/#nix-install-macos Package management: Nix-darwin https://github.com/nix-darwin/nix-darwin Browsers: - Librewolf https://librewolf.net - Tor https://www.torproject.org - Orion https://orionbrowser.com Video downloader: Yt-dlp https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp Video/audio player: Mpv https://github.com/mpv-player/mpv Video editor: LosslessCut http", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: New clean macOS install. Must-have apps? Best browser?"}, {"id": 777626576, "item_id": 48601661, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48601661", "by": "gwerbin", "date": "2026-06-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I used to have a Latex resume and switched to LibreOffice several years ago. It gives me more than enough precise control over layout and styling, with less effort", "excerpt": "MS Word can be a surprisingly good and powerful type setting system if you use its fancier features correctly, like named styles. I used to have a Latex resume and switched to LibreOffice several years ago. It gives me more than enough precise control over layout and styling, with less effort, and it still generates good PDFs.", "context": "", "use_case": "resume", "switched_from": "LaTeX", "story": "The Productivity J-Curve [pdf]"}, {"id": 773492352, "item_id": 48343272, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48343272", "by": "fithisux", "date": "2026-05-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I have been a happy exclusive only user of OO/LibeOffice since 2004", "excerpt": "There are many open source alternatives/upgrades to M$$$ products. No reason to keep using them. Literally none. I have been a happy exclusive only user of OO/LibeOffice since 2004. Some times I needed to use MSOffice for a paper. It was always problematic. I haven't use VS since 2007. I migrated to gcc. Never had a problem. SQLServer? Only for demo and at work just to pull or save data. Postgres always saved the day", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "Microsoft Office", "story": "Microsoft degrades functionality of perpetually-licensed offline products"}, {"id": 773480624, "item_id": 48342539, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48342539", "by": "jamwise", "date": "2026-05-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Been using LibreOffice for years. Everyone should.", "excerpt": "Been using LibreOffice for years. Everyone should. If we don't vote with our choices companies like Microsoft will keep pushing the envelope until you have to pay a monthly fee to turn on your own computer. https://www.libreoffice.org/", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "Microsoft degrades functionality of perpetually-licensed offline products"}, {"id": 767176864, "item_id": 47948554, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47948554", "by": "anonthrownaway", "date": "2026-04-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use LibreOffice on Mac mostly because it allows me to use their dialogs", "excerpt": ">The only difference is that the menus, dialogs, file pickers, keyboard shortcuts, and windowing all use native macOS Cocoa APIs. Why would I want native macOS dialogs where the save as dialog can only show 32 characters on the screen at once? I use LibreOffice on Mac mostly because it allows me to use their dialogs instead of the crap macOS ones...", "context": "Mac user", "use_case": "office suite on Mac", "switched_from": "", "story": "Notepad++ Code Editor Comes to Mac After 20-Year Wait"}, {"id": 766744320, "item_id": 47921520, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47921520", "by": "anonthrownaway", "date": "2026-04-27", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I am in LibreOffice, which lets me disable the native save as dialog box and use the works as expected LibreOffice one.", "excerpt": "Amazing HW. SW that is stunningly bad. My example that makes me want to divest myself from my all-in on Apple's ecosystem: Native save as dialog box with a filename text box that shows (at most) 32 characters on the screen at once. Even with the smallest dialog box width possible, there is room to make the filename more than 64 characters. Resizing the box does nothing. They can't be eating their own dogfood here rig", "context": "", "use_case": "document editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tim Cook Is Leaving. Good"}, {"id": 765259696, "item_id": 47828731, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47828731", "by": "rolph", "date": "2026-04-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "i recommend you orient to it, for future proofing.", "excerpt": "your sure? its really not that hard, and it might be useful, if MS ends up finding that final straw that breaks it for everyone, you would be better off having a head start and level ground, rather than staring up a wall for employment. i recommend you orient to it, for future proofing. scripting: https://help.libreoffice.org/latest/en-US/text/shared/guide/scripting.html API: https://api.libreoffice.org/docs/idl/ref/", "context": "", "use_case": "spreadsheet scripting replacing Excel VBA", "switched_from": "", "story": "Swiss authorities want to reduce dependency on Microsoft"}, {"id": 762447456, "item_id": 47652966, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47652966", "by": "contingencies", "date": "2026-04-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use and promote Libreoffice instead of cloud SaaS and M$ religiously and have been doing so for decades.", "excerpt": "I use and promote Libreoffice instead of cloud SaaS and M$ religiously and have been doing so for decades. While it does feel that 'peak office suite' is solidly in the rear-view mirror and the majority of tools are becoming ~irrelevant (nobody does physical meetings anymore, writer < LyX and spreadsheets are being supplanted by custom code with better visualization control and web integration), I still need Writer t", "context": "deals with lawyers and investors", "use_case": "Writer for legal docs, Calc for financials", "switched_from": "Microsoft Office", "story": "LibreOffice \u2013 Let's put an end to the speculation"}, {"id": 762015520, "item_id": 47625970, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47625970", "by": "piokoch", "date": "2026-04-03", "stance": "compare", "quote": "LibeOffice as a replacement for Office365 only shows that the site authors does not know what is Office365.", "excerpt": "So, I've looked on alternatives to iPhone. The \"little\" problem is that if I use online banking in Europe I will not be able to use most of them as a bank required 2FA. Another funny thing is that they offer as an alternatives China produced phones (most \"Nokia\" models that does not have anything to do with original Nokia brand), as if supporting Xi regime was somehow better than buying in USA. LibeOffice as a replac", "context": "", "use_case": "Office365 replacement", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: European alternatives to Google, Apple, Dropbox and 120 US apps"}, {"id": 760502016, "item_id": 47531376, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47531376", "by": "sailorganymede", "date": "2026-03-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I donated - it's valuable software and I love it very much.", "excerpt": "I donated - it's valuable software and I love it very much. My feeling is as long as it's not hounding me for future payments i.e. calling me up during the day, it's fine.", "context": "donor", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice and the Art of Overreacting"}, {"id": 760489376, "item_id": 47530586, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47530586", "by": "p-t", "date": "2026-03-26", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "i use libreoffice largely for spreadsheets and just open the spreadsheet program directly", "excerpt": "I honestly forgot there was even a \"base\" UI to open documents from, i use libreoffice largely for spreadsheets and just open the spreadsheet program directly XD", "context": "", "use_case": "spreadsheets", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice and the Art of Overreacting"}, {"id": 760472304, "item_id": 47529519, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47529519", "by": "smcleod", "date": "2026-03-26", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Libreoffice just feels so clunky and Java-ish to use.", "excerpt": "Not related to donations but product wise Libreoffice just feels so clunky and Java-ish to use. I switched to OnlyOffice a year ago and other than its almost complete lack of settings it's been so much nicer to use.", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice and the Art of Overreacting"}, {"id": 753589600, "item_id": 47099350, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47099350", "by": "Flavius", "date": "2026-02-21", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It looks ancient, worse than office apps from 20 years ago.", "excerpt": "Take a look at these screenshots: https://libreoffice.en.uptodown.com/mac It looks ancient, worse than office apps from 20 years ago.", "context": "", "use_case": "office suite UI", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice blasts OnlyOffice for working with Microsoft to lock users in"}, {"id": 735457810, "item_id": 45966113, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45966113", "by": "edferda", "date": "2025-11-18", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Libre office spreadsheets are terrible when compared to Excel.", "excerpt": "I\u2019ve been using Windows my entire life. In the past, I tried Linux without much success, switching back within a few weeks. However, Microsoft\u2019s software is just beyond bad these days. Simple actions take seconds, the UI/UX feels designed to make you waste time, and the fundamentals of what an OS should do feel broken. It\u2019s hard to overstate how bad quality has gotten. This motivated me to move to Linux and installed", "context": "lifelong Windows user, uses Windows at work", "use_case": "spreadsheets", "switched_from": "", "story": "Windows 11 adds AI agent that runs in background with access to personal folders"}, {"id": 733377392, "item_id": 45836087, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45836087", "by": "k310", "date": "2025-11-06", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "May I recommend Libre Office? [0] For casual/home use, it should meet needs. Free, no subscription.", "excerpt": "May I recommend Libre Office? [0] For casual/home use, it should meet needs. Free, no subscription. Spreadsheet can collaborate. [1] Collabra Office seems to be the port of LibreOffice to ios. (free) Look it up on the app store. > Collabora Office is a text editor, spreadsheet and presentation program based on LibreOffice, the world's most popular Open Source office suite - and now it's on iOS, enhancing your possibi", "context": "", "use_case": "casual home office suite", "switched_from": "", "story": "Refund requests flood Microsoft after tricking users into AI upgrades"}]}