How do I get the classic Excel menu back in Excel 2010

FFS This change was made way back in 2007, and this programmer was the wrong side of 50 in 2000, so I know all about Word versions before 2007 - all the way back to the DOS version and beyond! Most experienced office users whinged at the time - I know I did - at the temporary loss of productivity, but we soon got used to the changes.

Those changes were necessary to enable the Office product to be developed across different platforms.

You can have as many windows open as you wish, and Windows 10 especially (but certainly from 7 on) makes it a simple matter to switch between windows from the Windows task bar or via a keyboard shortcut.

Microsoft is not going back to the classic menu system any time soon, so get over it and move on.

Actually it speaks volumes of the age of the person that answered. Anyone that thinks this new format of "Ribbon" menu (visual) and removing (or changing the functionality of) hotkeys (forcing you to always have to laboriously and time-consumingly use your finger or a mouse - or search and learn new functionality after years of consistent use) - rather than hotkeys that were previously available and exponentially improved the time required to implement an action...has to be a programer born after the year 2000. I guarantee you that using excel 2003 I could complete tasks about 50% faster than a millennial. Hands down! This is the most frustrating change... can't comprehend it at all. And the fact you don't even have an option to open the classic menu is as frustrating as Windows 8 was to 7. And it makes me want to just stick to a free spreadsheet program like Open Office at no cost and learn that program's functions instead. Why MS developers would think it's smart to force long-standing users to drive a completely new piece of equipment - rather than at least maintaining and building upon the well-oiled, perfectly operating machine that existed ....  all to satisfy the new mindset driven by programmers that never knew the beauty of the functionality of a product used less than a decade ago is stunning! And now other companies (for a price) are offering to add that functionality back in...hmmmm...perhaps those companies are actually subsidiaries of MS? Why else would you remove necessary and learned functionality at the expense of full generationS of users? Incredible. The ribbon should have been an innovative addition - NOT something to force users to completely relearn the functionality of the software. On top of that - no multiple window/toggle functionality?????!!!! From what I can see without multiple monitors....???????   Whoever is in charge of this should be fired.

DOCX (XLSX) will always be smaller than the equivalent DOC(XLS) file, because it is a compressed XLM format - a zip file. Change the extension from DOCX(XLSX) to ZIP and you can open it to view the individual files that make up the XML structure. DOC(XLS) is an uncompressed format. Compress to ZIP to see how much smaller that could be.

Don't get your hopes up about Microsoft and Word Perfect. It's not going to happen. If you want it, it is still available from Corel.

Rohn007, yes, WP has a different file structure - that was my point.

I have checked a lot of DOC/DOCXs.  DOCX was significantly smaller every time, though I did not note the variations in percentages.   The differences between XLS and XLSX seemed lower.  With PPT/PPTX I am not sure there was an obvious pattern, but then I tested very little.  I expect that was the most 'content-driven'.

As regards the word processor, ideally MS would buy WordPerfect, add any decent Word features to it (if any...), rename it Word and sell that as its product.  It would be so much better....