Editing Microsoft Office files in Google Docs is a pain. You can view them there, but you’ve previously had to convert them to Google’s format before you could edit, comment, and collaborate inside Docs. That’s about to change: Google just announced that it’s adding native support for Microsoft’s Word, Excel, and PowerPoint formats — like .docx, .xls, and .ppt — which will let you do real-time collaboration in the commercial versions of Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides.
Again, we’re talking about the commercial versions of those apps right now, namely G Suite, so this is something your company’s IT admins will be enabling (or disabling) in the short term. It’s not something that’s necessarily available for all Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides users yet.
Presumably, this is something that could come to end users, too — unless Google has to pay Microsoft to get this functionality for some reason.
G Suite customers should see support start to roll out in April or May, depending on which release schedule your company prefers. Here’s the full list of supported filetypes, according to Google:
Word files: .doc, .docx, .dot
Excel files: .xls, .xlsx, .xlsm (macro enabled Excel files), .xlt
Powerpoint files: .ppt, .pptx, .pps, .pot
Yesterday, Google announced that it would let you create and collaborate on Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides files through Dropbox Business as well.
This article is from The Verge
