Office for iPad: What you need to know…

Bang on form, Microsoft unveiled Office for iPad at the company's cloud and mobile conference in San Francisco last week.

As reported by TechDay earlier in the month, CEO Satya Nadella reaffirmed Redmond's vision of a "Mobile First - Cloud First" focus, centred around "delivering the cloud for everyone, on evert device.

"It's a unique approach that centres on people — enabling the devices you love, work with the services you love, and in a way that works for IT and developers," said Nadella, when discussing the intersection of cloud and mobile.

So as of now, Office 365 subscribers can add an iPad as one of their chosen devices included in their subscription benefits, and can create and edit documents with Word for iPad, PowerPoint for iPad and Excel for iPad.

Available as free downloads from the App Store, Microsoft says the move will enable users to read and present documents, spreadsheets and presentations.

Delving deeper into the offering, Office for iPad brings full file fidelity across Office on PC, Mac, tablet and phone, and along with cloud storage from OneDrive or OneDrive for Business your files are up to date, wherever you need them on whatever device you want to use.

Despite creating Office for iPad apps which have a familiar look and feel that are "unmistakably Office", Nadella insists the apps are built from the ground up for iPad, "factoring in the unique nature of touch and functionality native to iPad along with what people most commonly want to do on a tablet.

Below is a selection of official Microsoft answers to some questions you may have regarding Office for iPad:

How much does Office for iPad cost?

You can download the Office apps for free and read, view and present documents, spreadsheets and presentations. To get the full editing and creation experience, you need an Office 365 subscription.

Can I try Office for iPad?

Yes, you can read, view and present documents, spreadsheets and presentations for free. To get the full editing and creation experience, you can sign up for a free 30 day Office 365 trial at www.office.com/try. Then download the Office for iPad apps in the App Store. During your trial period, you can use Office across your PC, Mac and iPad.

What Office 365 subscription plans include Office for iPad?

Office 365 Home, Office 365 Small Business Premium, Office 365 Midsize Business, Office 365 E3 and E4 (Enterprise and Government), Office 365 Education A3 and A4, Office 365 ProPlus, and Office 365 University. The new Office 365 Personal will also qualify when it becomes available later this spring.

What are the system requirements for Office for iPad?

You need an iPad running iOS 7.0 or later.

What languages and markets is Office for iPad available in?

We offer Office for iPad in the following 29 languages: Catalan, Croatian, Czech, Danish , Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Malay, Norwegian, Polish , Brazilian Portuguese, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Simplified Chinese, Slovak, Spanish , Swedish, Traditional Chinese, Turkish, Ukrainian.

More details on the announcement can be found by visiting the official Office blog.