What used to be Microsoft Office Mobile for Office 365 Subscribers is now a set of three, free apps that you can install on your iPhone separately.



The all-in-one Office app has been replaced by the Word iPhone app, Excel iPhone app, and PowerPoint iPhone app.



There are positive and negative effects to this change, so before you install the new apps, make sure you know these three important facts.



1. "Free" Mostly Means Free
 Let's start with some good news. The new apps are free. They're free to download, free to use to view documents, free to create and edit documents—but there are some feature restrictions for users who don't subscribe to Office 365. More on that in point No. 3.



Word (for iPhone) With the previous Office Mobile app, you needed an Office 365 subscription (at $99 per year or $9.99 per month for a personal home account) to do anything more than view files. Without a subscription, you could not create or edit documents.



With the new apps, you do need to sign in with a Microsoft account of some kind to create and edit documents, but free accounts work. Even an old Hotmail email address will do.



2. Size Matters!
You would think that one of the benefits of having separate mobile apps for each desktop app (Word, Excel, and PowerPoint) would be that you can install only the ones you need, as opposed to one gigantic app, therefore saving space on your phone. With Microsoft's new apps, think again. They're all space-chomping bombs.



Take a look at how these hogs measure up against similar apps: