(That takes care of General License Terms #1 and #2 above.) Most small and medium businesses don’t license Office as an “Enterprise Product” (because they don’t have an Enterprise Agreement) or on a company-wide basis (see this blog post for an explanation of a “company-wide” scenario). That license is assigned to the desktop and so the software is installed on the desktop. Notice that there is only once license involved. Local use of the software running on a portable device is permitted for the primary user of the Licensed Device.Ĭlear as mud? Here’s a diagram to help explain:.Unless you license the software as an Enterprise Product or on a company-wide basis, you may also install the software on a single portable device.You may install the software on the Licensed Device ….You must assign each license to a single device.Here are the terms that apply to our situation: You will find Office listed under the section entitled “Desktop Applications (Per Device).” Just like all the other products in this category (Lync client, Project, and Visio), Microsoft Office is covered by the “General License Terms” of this section. You can download the PUR here for a bit of light reading.

If you purchase a volume license of Office, then it can be shared between the desktop and the laptop.Īs I’ve mentioned before on this blog, the authoritative document for licensing questions such as this is the “Microsoft Volume Licensing Product Use Rights” document or “PUR” for short. The basic idea behind the benefit is this: if you have an employee who uses a desktop in the office and a laptop in the field, you only need to buy Office once for that employee. One of those benefits was that “a single volume license of Office gives you the right to install Office on a desktop and a laptop if both devices have the same primary user.” I promised a blog post that would clarify that topic, so here goes… In a previous post, I provided a list of seven licensing benefits that many people are unaware of.

Office 2019 standard volume license