At Microsoft"s Build 2017 developer conference earlier this year, the company confirmed that at some point in the future, the Windows Store will be how Office 365 customers obtain the suite of productivity apps. Since the launch of Windows 10 S with the Surface Laptop, users of the OS have been the only ones able to try out the preview, but now, Microsoft is inviting Insiders to try it out as well.
There are a number of benefits to using the apps from the Store, rather than from the web. Not only is it a cleaner uninstall, but now you"ll be able to choose which Office apps you want on your machine. Previously, the entire suite came as a bundle in one big downloadable package. Many Office users don"t use apps like Access and Publisher, so if you want, you can uninstall them individually.
If you"ve been selected for the preview, you"ll be able to search the Store to find the apps, or you can use the links provided in the email. You"ll need to make sure that your current installation of Office 2016 is uninstalled first; otherwise, the Store will just download the executable package from the web. After that, you can choose the Store listing that applies to you: Office 365 Personal or Office 365 Home.
The one thing that you lose through this method is OneNote 2016, but you"ll still have the OneNote UWP app. There doesn"t seem to be a way to get this back without reinstalling the entire Office suite from the web. We were told at Build that there will be a solution for this at some point for those that still want to use the legacy application.