I had MS Office Professional Plus 2016 on my old imac, the time machine backup of which I have installed on my new mac mini m1. It does not allow me to use or activate the software although it has copied across. Any suggestions for what I need to do?
Mac mini, macOS 12.1
Microsoft retired Office 2016 a few years back and along with other retired products (Office 2011 for Mac), has disabled the license servers. Since there is no means to activate the old Office 2016 for Mac software, you need to purchase Office 2021 for Mac, install and activate that product. Or, subscribe to the current Microsoft 365.
Microsoft retired Office 2016 a few years back and along with other retired products (Office 2011 for Mac), has disabled the license servers. Since there is no means to activate the old Office 2016 for Mac software, you need to purchase Office 2021 for Mac, install and activate that product. Or, subscribe to the current Microsoft 365.
I was under the impression that it could still be activated.
I suspect that it just needs to be re-installed. Migrating Office using Time Machine has never worked well, if at all, unless you were using the App Store versions of the Office apps with a MS 365 subscription.
VikingOSX is correct that you can't complete a new activation for 2016. But, as in tbirdvet's situation, you can transfer the necessary activation files across and the apps will behave as if you've already activated them on the new Mac.
Other than being in your user account, I can't recall exactly where these files are. I think they're part of the Office folders in the Group Containers folder.
Thank you. That explains it.
I used my TM backup to migrate Office 2016 to my M1 with Big Sur and no issues. I then upgraded to Monterey and still no issues. Since then I have installed Office 2021.
I had MS Office Professional Plus 2016 on my old imac, the time machine backup of which I have installed on my new mac mini m1. It does not allow me to use or activate the software although it has copied across.
