Microsoft is preparing an Office suite for Apple Silicon. Now in beta testing

When Apple showed us at the WWDC 2020 developer conference in June about the transition to its own chips from the Apple Silicon family for the Mac, it brought with it a number of different questions. Apple users were most afraid mainly because of applications that theoretically may not be available on the new platform. Of course, the Californian giant has fully optimized the necessary apple applications, including Final Cut and others. But what about such an office package as Microsoft Office, which is relied on by a huge group of users every day?

Source: Unsplash

Microsoft has just updated its Office 2019 suite for Mac, specifically adding full support for macOS Big Sur. This has nothing to do with new products specifically. On the newly introduced MacBook Air, 13″ MacBook Pro and Mac mini, it will still be possible to run applications such as Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneOne and OneDrive - that is, under one condition. The condition, however, is that the individual programs will first have to be "translated" through the Rosetta 2 software. This serves as a special layer for translating applications that are originally written for x86-64 platforms, i.e. for Macs with Intel processors.

Gallery

mpv-shot0071

mpv-shot0072

mpv-shot0073

mpv-shot0075

mpv-shot0076

mpv-shot0077

mpv-shot0078

mpv-shot0079

mpv-shot0080

mpv-shot0081

mpv-shot0082

mpv-shot0083

mpv-shot0084

mpv-shot0085

mpv-shot0086

Fortunately, Rosetta 2 should perform slightly better than the OG Rosetta, which Apple bet on in 2005 when switching from PowerPC to Intel. The earlier version interpreted the code itself in real time, while now the entire process will take place even before the initial launch. Because of this, it will of course take longer to turn on the program, but it will then run more stably. Microsoft also said that because of this, the mentioned first launch will take about 20 seconds, when we will see the application icon constantly jumping in the Dock. Fortunately, the next launch will be faster.

Apple M1: The first chip from the Apple Silicon family

An office suite fully optimized for the Apple Silicon platform should be in the minor branch in beta testing. It can therefore be expected that relatively soon after the entry of new Apple computers into the market, we will also see a full-fledged version of the Office 2019 package. For the sake of interest, we can also mention the transition of applications from Adobe here. For example, Photoshop should not arrive until next year, while Microsoft is trying to provide its software in the best form as soon as possible.