How to detect installed version of MS-Office

Question

Does anyone know what would be the best way to detect which version of Office is installed   Plus  if there are multiple versions of Office installed  I d like to know what versions they are   A bonus would be if I can detect the specific version s  of Excel that is  are  installed

User · Accepted Answer

One way to check for the installed Office version would be to check the InstallRoot registry keys for the Office applications of interest.

For example, if you would like to check whether Word 2007 is installed you should check for the presence of the following Registry key:

HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Word\InstallRoot::Path

This entry contains the path to the executable.

Replace 12.0 (for Office 2007) with the corresponding version number:

Office 97   -  7.0
Office 98   -  8.0
Office 2000 -  9.0
Office XP   - 10.0
Office 2003 - 11.0
Office 2007 - 12.0
Office 2010 - 14.0 (sic!)
Office 2013 - 15.0
Office 2016 - 16.0
Office 2019 - 16.0 (sic!)

The other applications have similar keys:

HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Excel\InstallRoot::Path
HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\PowerPoint\InstallRoot::Path

Or you can check the common root path of all applications:

HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Common\InstallRoot::Path

Another option, without using specific Registry keys would be to query the MSI database using the MSIEnumProducts API as described here.

As an aside, parallel installations of different Office versions are not officially supported by Microsoft. They do somewhat work, but you might get undesired effects and inconsistencies.

Update: Office 2019 and Office 365

As of Office 2019, MSI-based setup are no longer available, Click-To-Run is the only way to deploy Office now. Together with this change towards the regularly updated Office 365, also the major/minor version numbers of Office are no longer updated (at least for the time being). That means that – even for Office 2019 – the value used in Registry keys and the value returned by Application.Version (e.g. in Word) still is 16.0.

For the time being, there is no documented way to distinguish the Office 2016 from Office 2019. A clue might be the file version of the winword.exe; however, this version is also incremented for patched Office 2016 versions (see the comment by @antonio below).

If you need to distinguish somehow between Office versions, e.g. to make sure that a certain feature is present or that a minimum version of Office is installed, probably the best way it to look at the file version of one of the main Office applications:

// Using the file path to winword.exe
// Retrieve the path e.g. from the InstallRoot Registry key
var fileVersionInfo = FileVersionInfo.GetVersionInfo(@"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\root\Office16\WINWORD.EXE");
var version = new Version(fileVersionInfo.FileVersion);

// On a running instance using the `Process` class
var process = Process.GetProcessesByName("winword").First();
string fileVersionInfo = process.MainModule.FileVersionInfo.FileVersion;
var version = Version(fileVersionInfo);

~~The file version of Office 2019 is 16.0.10730.20102, so if you see anything greater than that you are dealing with Office 2019 or a current Office 365 version.~~

User · Answer

How about HKEY CLASSES ROOT Word Application CurVer

User · Answer

A bonus would be if I can detect the specific version s  of Excel that is  are  installed    I know the question has been asked and answered a long time ago  but this same question has kept me busy until I made this observation   To get the build number  e g  15 0 4569 1506   probe HKLM SOFTWARE Microsoft Office  VER  Common ProductVersion  LastProduct  where  VER  is the major version number  12 0 for Office 2007  14 0 for Office 2010  15 0 for Office 2013    On a 64-bit Windows  you need to insert Wow6432Node between the SOFTWARE and Microsoft crumbs  irrespective of the bitness of the Office installation   On my machines  this gives the version information of the originally installed version  For Office 2010 for instance  the numbers match the ones listed here  and they differ from the version reported in File  gt  Help  which reflects patches applied by hotfixes

User · Answer

public string WinWordVersion                       get                               string  version   string Empty                  Word Application WinWord   new Word Application                        switch  WinWord Version ToString                                          case  7 0     version    95                           break                      case  8 0    version    97                           break                      case  9 0    version    2000                           break                      case  10 0    version    2002                           break                      case  11 0     version    2003                           break                      case  12 0    version    2007                           break                      case  14 0    version    2010                           break                      case  15 0     version    2013                           break                      case  16 0    version    2016                           break                      default                                                      break                                     return WinWord Caption          version

User · Answer

If you ve installed 32-bit Office on a 64-bit machine  you may need to check for the presence of  SOFTWARE Wow6432Node Microsoft Office 12 0    substituting the 12 0 with the appropriate version  This is certainly the case for Office 2007 installed on 64-bit Windows 7   Note that Office 2010     14 0  is the first Office for which a 64-bit version exists

User · Answer

Why not check HKLM  SOFTWARE  Microsoft  Windows  CurrentVersion  App Paths   office exe   where  office exe  stands for particular office product exe-filename  e g  winword exe  excel exe etc  There you get path to executable and check version of that file    How to check version of the file  in C     in C   Any criticism towards such approach

User · Answer

namespace Software Info v1  0   using System  using System Collections Generic  using System Text  using Microsoft Office Interop   public class MS Office       public string GetOfficeVersion                 string sVersion   string Empty          Microsoft Office Interop Word Application appVersion   new Microsoft Office Interop Word Application            appVersion Visible   false          switch  appVersion Version ToString                          case  7 0                   sVersion    95                   break              case  8 0                   sVersion    97                   break              case  9 0                   sVersion    2000                   break              case  10 0                   sVersion    2002                   break              case  11 0                   sVersion    2003                   break              case  12 0                   sVersion    2007                   break              case  14 0                   sVersion    2010                   break              default                  sVersion    Too Old                    break                    Console WriteLine  MS office version      sVersion           return null

User · Answer

Despite the fact that this question has been answered long time ago  I found some interesting facts to add that are related to the answers above   As Dirk mentioned  there seems to be a weird fashion of version control from MS  starting from Office 365   2019  You cannot distinguish among the three 2016  2019  O365   by seeing at the executable paths anymore  And just like he reputed himself  looking at the builds of the executable  as a mean of telling which is what  isn t quite effective either   After some researching  I found a feasible solution  The solution lies under the registry subkey Computer HKEY CURRENT USER Software Microsoft Office 16 0 Common Licensing LicensingNext    So  my logic follows below   Case 1  If the computer has the MSOffice 2016 installed  there is no subkeys under Licensing   Case 2  if the computer has MSOffice 2019 installed  there is the name of the value  which is one of the Office Product ID    e g  Standard2019Volume   Case 3  if the computer has Office365 installed  there is a value called o365bussinessretail which is also a product ID  along with some other values   The possible productIds are provided here   To distinguish the three  I just opened the key and see if fails  If the open fails  its Office 2016  Then I enumerate LicensingNext and try to see if any name has a prefix o365  if it finds it then its O365  If it does not  then its Office 2019   Frankly speaking  I did not have enough time to test the logic under varying environment  So please  note that    Hope this will help whoever s interest

User · Answer

To whoever it might concern  here s my version that checks for Office 95-2019  amp  O365  both MSI based and ClickAndRun are supported  on both 32 and 64 bit systems  falls back to 32 bits when 64 bit version is not installed   Written in Python 3 5 but of course you can always use that logic in order to write your own code in another language  from winreg import   from typing import Tuple  Optional  List    Let s make sure the dictionnary goes from most recent to oldest KNOWN VERSIONS          16 0    2016 2019 O365        15 0    2013        14 0    2010        12 0    2007        11 0    2003        10 0    2002        9 0    2000        8 0    97        7 0    95       def get value hive  int  key  str  value  Optional str   arch  int   0  - gt  str       quot  quot  quot      Returns a value from a given registry path       param hive  registry hive  windows registry HKEY LOCAL MACHINE          param key   which registry key we re searching for      param value  which value we query  may be None if unnamed value is searched      param arch  which registry architecture we seek  0   default  windows registry KEY WOW64 64KEY  windows registry KEY WOW64 32KEY                   Giving multiple arches here will return first result      return  value      quot  quot  quot       def  get value hive  int  key  str  value  Optional str   arch  int  - gt  str          try              open reg   ConnectRegistry None  hive              open key   OpenKey open reg  key  0  KEY READ   arch              value  type   QueryValueEx open key  value                Return the first match             return value         except  FileNotFoundError  TypeError  OSError  as exc              raise FileNotFoundError  Registry key   s  with value   s  not found   s     key  value  exc          768   0   KEY WOW64 64KEY   KEY WOW64 32KEY  where 0   default      if arch    768          for  arch in  KEY WOW64 64KEY  KEY WOW64 32KEY               try                  return  get value hive  key  value   arch              except FileNotFoundError                  pass         raise FileNotFoundError     else          return  get value hive  key  value  arch    def get keys hive  int  key  str  arch  int   0  open reg  HKEYType   None  recursion level  int   1               filter on names  List str    None  combine  bool   False  - gt  dict       quot  quot  quot       param hive  registry hive  windows registry HKEY LOCAL MACHINE          param key  which registry key we re searching for      param arch  which registry architecture we seek  0   default  windows registry KEY WOW64 64KEY  windows registry KEY WOW64 32KEY       param open reg   handle  handle to already open reg key  for recursive searches   do not give this in your function call      param recursion level  recursivity level      param filter on names  list of strings we search  if none given  all value names are returned      param combine  shall we combine multiple arch results or return first match      return  list of strings      quot  quot  quot      def  get keys hive  int  key  str  arch  int  open reg  HKEYType  recursion level  int  filter on names  List str            try              if not open reg                  open reg   ConnectRegistry None  hive              open key   OpenKey open reg  key  0  KEY READ   arch              subkey count  value count      QueryInfoKey open key               output                  values                  for index in range value count                   name  value  type   EnumValue open key  index                  if isinstance filter on names  list  and name not in filter on names                      pass                 else                      values append   name   name   value   value   type   type               if not values                        output       values              if recursion level  gt  0                  for subkey index in range subkey count                       try                          subkey name   EnumKey open key  subkey index                          sub values   get keys hive 0  key key          subkey name  arch arch                                                open reg open reg  recursion level recursion level - 1                                                filter on names filter on names                          output subkey name    sub values                     except FileNotFoundError                          pass              return output          except  FileNotFoundError  TypeError  OSError  as exc              raise FileNotFoundError  Cannot query registry key   s    s     key  exc          768   0   KEY WOW64 64KEY   KEY WOW64 32KEY  where 0   default      if arch    768          result              for  arch in  KEY WOW64 64KEY  KEY WOW64 32KEY               try                  if combine                      result update  get keys hive  key   arch  open reg  recursion level  filter on names                   else                      return  get keys hive  key   arch  open reg  recursion level  filter on names              except FileNotFoundError                  pass         return result     else          return  get keys hive  key  arch  open reg  recursion level  filter on names    def get office click and run ident          type     - gt  Optional str       quot  quot  quot      Try to find the office product via clickandrun productID      quot  quot  quot      try          click and run ident   get value HKEY LOCAL MACHINE                                                   r Software Microsoft Office ClickToRun Configuration                                                     ProductReleaseIds                                                    arch KEY WOW64 64KEY  KEY WOW64 32KEY       except FileNotFoundError          click and run ident   None     return click and run ident   def  get used word version          type     - gt  Optional int       quot  quot  quot      Try do determine which version of Word is used  in case multiple versions are installed       quot  quot  quot      try          word ver   get value HKEY CLASSES ROOT  r Word Application CurVer   None      except FileNotFoundError          word ver   None     try          version   int word ver split      2       except  IndexError  ValueError  AttributeError           version   None     return version   def  get installed office version          type     - gt  Optional str  bool       quot  quot  quot      Try do determine which is the highest current version of Office installed      quot  quot  quot      for possible version    in KNOWN VERSIONS items            try              office keys   get keys HKEY LOCAL MACHINE                                                 r SOFTWARE Microsoft Office     format possible version                                                  recursion level 2                                                 arch KEY WOW64 64KEY  KEY WOW64 32KEY                                                 combine True               try                  is click and run   True if office keys  ClickToRunStore   is not None else False             except                  is click and run   False              try                  is valid   True if office keys  Word   is not None else False                 if is valid                      return possible version  is click and run             except KeyError                  pass         except FileNotFoundError              pass     return None  None   def get office version          type     - gt  Tuple str  Optional str        quot  quot  quot      It s plain horrible to get the office version installed     Let s use some tricks  ie detect current Word used      quot  quot  quot       word version    get used word version       office version  is click and run    get installed office version          Prefer to get used word version instead of installed one     if word version is not None          office version   word version      version   float office version      click and run ident   get office click and run ident        def  get office version              type     - gt  str         if version              if version  lt  16                  try                      return KNOWN VERSIONS     0  format version                   except KeyError                      pass               Special hack to determine which of 2016  2019 or O365 it is             if version    16                  if isinstance click and run ident  str                       if  2016  in click and run ident                          return  2016                      if  2019  in click and run ident                          return  2019                      if  O365  in click and run ident                          return  O365                  return  2016 2019 O365            Let s return whatever we found out         return  Unknown      format version  click and run ident       if isinstance click and run ident  str  or is click and run          click and run suffix    ClickAndRun      else          click and run suffix   None      return  get office version    click and run suffix  You can than use the code like the following example  office version  click and run   get office version   print  Office        format office version  click and run    Remarks  Didn t test with office  lt  2010 though Python typing is different between the registry functions and the office functions since I wrote the registry ones before finding out that pypy   python2 does not like typing    On those python interpreters you might just remove typing completly Any improvements are highly welcome

[c#] How to detect installed version of MS-Office?

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