Standalone Publisher / Office Professional Plus 2021

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Standalone Publisher / Office Professional Plus 2021

Graham 20

Hi, following on from a question I posted in another thread and advice to start a new thread.

My question was "Hi, I'm not very techy so please bear with me. As others, trying to retain access to Publsher so followed the advice on here. Created a new account and downloaded Office 2021. When it installed it referred to installation of Microsoft 365 and Office so to be honest I've no idea whether it is correctly installed or not.

Any advice gratefully received, particularly what reported "conflicts" might be between the two programs.

Thanks"

@Stefan Blom responded - thank you "The Office installer frequently uses "Microsoft 365 and Office" to refer to either a subscription or a perpetual license, so those words do not indicate that something is wrong.

As you may know, you'll need Office Professional 2021 to install Publisher. That product is no longer sold by Microsoft (though it was sold by Microsoft as recently as a few months back).

Note that if you purchased Office Professional 2021 recently from a third-party seller, be very careful so that you didn't get a faulty product which you won't be able to install and activate properly.

If you have follow-up questions, please start your own thread. The current one is from 2025."

I have a feeling that in trying to create a new Windows user account solely to install the Office Publisher Professional Plus 2021 program it may have become linked to a M365 account. As I say I'm not techy so don't understand the potential implications or how I can resolve any potential conflicts.
The aim of course is to keep Publisher available and operational after it is no longer part of M365.
I don't particularly want to uninstall and reinstall M365 and Office 2021 but is that potentially the course of action I need to follow? Presumably, also deleting and recreating the separate User account? Any idiot proof guidance would be hugely appreciated.

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Answer accepted by question author

Demi Nguyen 1,665 Independent Advisor

Hello Graham,

Thank you for providing the additional details.

Creating a separate Windows user account is fine for keeping your personal settings and files separate, and there is no need to delete that account at this stage.

To confirm which Office product is currently activated, please follow these steps:

Sign in to the Windows user account where Office 2021 was installed.
Open Publisher or another Office application.
Go to File > Account > Product Information.
Check the product name shown under Product Activated.

User's image

The attached screenshot is an example showing Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2019. In your case, if Product Information shows Office Professional 2021/Office Professional Plus 2021, this confirms that a perpetual Office 2021 license is activated. Office Professional 2021 includes Publisher for Windows.

Please note that Microsoft 365 and Office Professional 2021/Office Professional Plus 2021 use different licensing methods. Microsoft 365 is a subscription-based product, so the Office applications check the Microsoft account signed in to confirm that it has an active Microsoft 365 license. By comparison, Office Professional 2021/Office Professional Plus 2021 are perpetual products that use their own one-time product licenses.

Creating a separate Windows user account does not convert Office Professional 2021/Office Professional Plus 2021 into Microsoft 365 or link the two licenses together. If File > Account > Product Information shows Office Professional 2021/Office Professional Plus 2021 as activated and Publisher is available in that Windows profile, you can continue using that profile without recreating the Windows account.

One final point to keep in mind is that support for Publisher and Office 2021 ends in October 2026. The applications may continue to run afterward, but Microsoft will no longer provide security updates, bug fixes, or technical support. It is therefore advisable to begin converting important Publisher files to another format for long-term access.

Kind regards,

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Answer 1

What was described is the expected risk area: Microsoft 365 Apps and Office 2021 are not designed to run side by side on the same device when they include overlapping apps such as Word, Excel, Outlook, and Publisher. The usual problems are installation, activation, update, and file-association conflicts, where one version can override the other.

The wording "Microsoft 365 and Office" during setup does not by itself mean the wrong product was installed. That installer wording is used broadly for both subscription and perpetual Office products.

A practical way to check what is actually installed is:

Sign in to the Windows user account where Office 2021 was installed.
Open an Office app in that account.
Go to File > Account.
Check the product name shown there.
- On Windows, the Account page shows which version is running.
- If it shows Office LTSC 2021, that confirms a perpetual 2021-family installation.

If the goal is to keep Publisher available after it is removed from Microsoft 365, the supported guidance in the available material is to avoid relying on Microsoft 365 and Office 2021 working independently on the same device for different apps. There is no supported configuration to reliably isolate Publisher 2021 while keeping the overlapping Microsoft 365 apps active on that same machine.

The most reliable options are:

Use a separate environment for Publisher 2021, such as:
- a separate Windows user account on the PC, as already attempted
- a separate PC
- a virtual machine
Keep Microsoft 365 on the primary environment for the subscription apps and services.

If both suites are installed in the same Windows user account, uninstalling one of them is the safer path because side-by-side use can cause conflicts. If Office 2021 was installed only in the separate Windows user account, that separation is the workaround described in the available guidance and may reduce interference.

For a simple verification path before uninstalling anything:

In the separate Windows account, open an Office app and check File > Account.
Confirm whether the installed product identifies as a 2021 perpetual version.
If Publisher opens and works only in that separate account, leave Microsoft 365 in the main account and avoid reinstalling unless conflicts actually appear.
If activation or app-version switching starts happening across the same device, move Publisher 2021 to a more isolated setup such as a separate PC or virtual machine.

No context supports deleting and recreating the Windows user account as a required step. The supported concern is coexistence on the same device, not the existence of the second Windows account itself.

Also note that if Office Professional Plus 2021 came from a volume-license or organization-managed source, installation steps can differ and may require the organization’s IT department.