Home Office & Student 2021 for Mac standalone re-installation

Michael Vallance wrote:

Microsoft Office for Mac.

Today (Oct.23, 2026) Microsoft updated my Office application WITHOUT my permission. I purposely bought the Home Office & Student 2021 for Mac standalone (not 365) with a one-time payment because I do not want to subscribe. Today my Office apps are all 2026 and I cannot do anything unless I purchase 365.

Being on a Mac and not expecting any support from Microsoft, can anyone here advise me how to 'downgrade' back to my 2021 Office, please?

see if there is anything here—

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/lifecycle/officeinstall/download-and-install-or-reinstall-office-2021-office-2019-or-office-2016

Use Microsoft 365 apps for free on the web

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/free-office-online-for-the-web

there is some more associated links

MS OFFICE HOME & STUDENT 2021 - Apple Community

ref: Office 2021 perpetual version no longer working

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/answers/questions/6046822/office-2021-perpetual-version-no-longer-working

Microsoft Corporation/Customer service

1 (800) 642-7676

Just download LibreOffice and ditch all the MS stuff. LO is free, will open MS Office files and is similar enough to MS Office to be picked up fairly easily. The help forums are OK too.

Thank you very much for the links. Many others are complaining to Microsoft at the link

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/answers/questions/6046822/office-2021-perpetual-version-no-longer-working

and a possible solution may reside there. I'll try.

Good advice. I have OpenOffice so I may ditch MS Office. I'd like to use Pages, Keynote and Numbers but I believe they too now follow the subscription model.