What is the best free office suite alternative in 2026?

[Mike]

Tried the obvious things and wanted to know what actually works.

Real world performance is what matters, not benchmark numbers.

What would you do in this situation?

[Fan22]

Good shout. Cheers

[Asher16]

Don't sleep on Collabora Online if you want something self-hosted. Setup is a bit of a headache with Docker, but once it is running, browser-based editing works surprisingly well on low-spec hardware.

[RandyOrton04]

Has anyone actually tried FreeOffice by SoftMaker recently? I gave it a spin last month, and compatibility with complex docx files is miles ahead of LibreOffice. The catch is that the free tier nags you to upgrade to the paid version, which gets old fast.

[codeberg]

At this point, why not just use Google Docs or the free web versions of Microsoft 365? Unless you live out in the woods with zero internet, local installs feel a bit retro in 2026. Plus, zero risk of losing data when a hard drive gives up.

[Binary Hermit]

LibreOffice is still the heavy lifter here, especially if you deal with massive spreadsheets. Version 25.x finally fixed that dreadful rendering lag on high-DPI displays. It is not flashy, but it gets the job done without phoning home every five minutes.

[Millie98]

Web apps are fine until your ISP drops connection right before a midnight deadline. Local software like LibreOffice is insurance against flaky Wi-Fi and subscription price hikes. Long live open source.