Office Store is open for business now

Microsoft announced Office 2013 preview on July 17 and since then there has been a flood of topics on Office 2013. We introduced Office 2013 section on C# Corner. On Office 2013 section, several members have already contributing articles on Word 2013, Excel 2013 and even Access 2013.

One of the new features introduced in Office 2013 is the Office Store. I am sure you have heard of Windows Store in Windows 8 where you can buy and sell Windows 8 apps. This is exactly same as Apple iTunes where we can buy and sell iPhone and iPad apps. The difference here is, these apps will be installed on your Windows 8 PC.

Office 2013 allows developers to build Office app and they can sell these Office apps on the Office Store. I am still unsure why Microsoft would want Office Store different than Windows Store. This is just confusing to have too many stores. They should have just had one store and let it filter based on where users are coming from and what they are looking for. For example, if I am coming from a Word 2013 document to the store, I should see Windows Store displaying Office related apps only.

Anyway, I am going off the topic. Let's get back to the Office Store.

The Office Store is now open and you can download and install apps.

To test it out, you must have Office 2013 Preview installed on your machine.

As a matter of fact, I am writing this article in Word 2013. To launch and browse the Office Store, click on the INSERT tab at the tab bar and then click on Apps for Office icon.

By default, you will see a list of Featured apps. You can simply double clock on any of the app to install it.

When you double click on an app, you will be sent to the Online Office Store where you will see an Add button (in green) and if the app is a paid or free.

In my next article, I will demonstrate how to download, install and start using your app within a Word 2013 document.

Check out Office 2013 section on C# Corner to learn more about Office 2013.