Often seen as a prestigious tool, the iPhone is one of the few devices that has personally saved me over a thousand dollars thanks to the glorious app store.
One prime example is office suites, as Microsoft can charge between $239-$400 just to install Word, Excel, Powerpoint and Outlook (the latter which I loathe) upon your notebook.
Instead of building up Microsoft’s stock, iLovers can instead choose to be thrifty and download inexpensive office suite apps for under $20.
Documents To Go Premium
Documents To Go Premium (by DataViz) is an app that provides support for not only Microsoft Word and Excel, but PowerPoint as well (a rarity within the app store).
Of the dozens of office app suites that I have tested, Documents To Go has provided the most elegant interface for both Word and Excel, although its lack of folder support within the iPhone may drive a few organizing gurus crazy.
Documents To Go’s strongest asset is its deep exchange support, which allows users to import attachments from various email accounts and edit them directly upon the iPhone. You can also sync files created on your notebook or desktop to your iPhone, or import and export files from the cloud via Google Docs.
Price: $14.99
Quickoffice Connect Mobile Suite
The Quickoffice iPhone app supports both Microsoft Word, Excel and Notepad (with Powerpoint support coming in the near future).
While it may lack some of the power of its rivals, Quickoffice’s app suite is a lot more intuitive, giving this app more of an “Apple feel” than either Documents To Go or Office Squared (although the apps overall are not as powerful as its rivals).
Quickoffice also heavily supports cloud services like Google Docs, MobileMe and Dropbox, making this app the perfect companion for road warriors on the go.
Price: $9.99
Office Squared
Created by Byte, Office Squared supports both Word and Excel with support for the cloud via Google Docs (plus MobileMe iDisk).
While Office Squared’s user interface is not as elegant when compared against its rivals, this app does pack a little more power as Office Squared allows users to insert multiple images and tables within a word document.
Power wise this tiny app does match most (if not all) of the features of its more expensive rivals (especially with Excel), although hopefully the company can “freshen up” the user interface (hint, hint).
Price: $4.99
Which should you buy?
If you have cash to spare, I would highly recommend you purchase Documents To Go, although Office Squared and Quickoffice are decent (if not less expensive) alternatives.
If anyone else has come across any other office suite apps (especially those supporting iWork for the iPhone) feel free to let us know in the comment section below!
One thought on “Forget Microsoft Office! Here Are 3 iPhone App Office Suites That Can Save You Over $300!”
Nice coverage of the basic options. This decision is the most important for me as I switch over to iphone. I’ll read a few more articles and talk to a few more people but it looks like Documents to Go for me.