Microsoft Word Online (First impression) compared to Google Word

Disclaimer: I typically prefer Google's solutions so my opinion may be biased but I try not to be. I have also been using Google Word for a good period of time, but have only used MS Word Online in the last couple days.

Overall, both solutions meet the basic needs for editing a word document.

So far, Google Word is by far more superior to MS Word Online. MS Word Online is also far behind the capabilities available in MS Office Word so there may be hope in the future of MS Word Online.

As of the time of this post, there are several things lacking in MS Word Online that is available on Google Word both of which are free as long as you have a login. Here is the list of things missing:

• Revision history
• Keyboard input (useful for international languages)
• Offline viewing (personally, I never used this in Google)
• Table of Contents (this was a huge surprise)

Pros:

• Similar layout to MS Office Word*
• 1-click styles (I use this all the time, Google word requires 2 clicks**)

Cons:

• Errors creating/loading word document***

* I know most people do not like the MS Office Word ribbon style, but I have really adapted to the ribbon and find it much more effective. I will admit that there is quite a relearning curve.

** There is a keyboard shortcut for Google word, but ctrl+alt+# is not a simple combination. 

*** This may have been temporary.

Other Notes:

I used Google Chrome for both. This may or may not have a difference to the experience of MS Word Online. I do not plan to test this in IE, maybe Firefox if only Chrome is not available.