Office 2016 Preview

Microsoft has limited the Office 2016 for Windows preview to customers with subscriptions to the enterprise-grade plans ProPlus, E3 and E4.

                                                   

The restriction took some users by surprise.

"The software appears to be looking for an Office 365 Professional Plus subscription instead of the Business/Business Premium/E plan subscriptions. The Connect page says otherwise," wrote someone identified as Rekab in a message posted to Microsoft's support forum on Monday after downloading the preview.

"I can confirm that after upgrading our Office 365 account to the E3 level I am able to successfully activate the Office 2016 Preview with my corporate account," replied Jrausch later that day. "Looks like the problem is that you need one of the Enterprise level subscriptions to use the Preview. That was not clear at all from the information that accompanied the announcement from Microsoft."