MS Office 365 License/subscription costs

I would appreciate if someone could clarify how the licensing/subscription
works for Office 365 ?

I ask because about 2 years ago, I bought a cheap Office 365 key on ebay
and the description of the advert indicated the key was not time limited.
I didn't have a good understanding of the license/subscription model, the
price was cheap, so I bought it. Everything worked for about a year and a half
and then a message popped up on all applications when they were opened:
"Product Deactivated" with options
"sign in - add this computer to an active account"
"enter key - I have a product key "

I now need to get MS Office again and don't want to fall into the same trap
Obviously Office 365 would be a better option than eg Office 2019 due to all updates
but does a subscription free version exist - on ebay, there are sellers who are
saying this i.e. buy and it works without time limit. I keep on
thinking subscription is the only way of paying for Office 365 - Office 2019
is a different story, I understand that it is purchased with a one time payment.

Can anyone comment ?

Office 365 is a subscription model for the office suite. You don't buy an activation code or key to register the software, instead you pay a monthly subscription cost to use the software. And they have since renamed Office 365 to Microsoft 365....so if you see those terms...it's the same thing.

You have 2 options, you buy the Office 365 for 1 user and it's $69.99 a year (USD). Or you buy Office 365 family and it's $99.99 a year. With 1 user, you get 1TB of OneDrive space and unlimited installs of Office on any device you have. With Office 365 family, you get access from 6 different Microsoft accounts. Each person gets 1TB of OneDrive space, and they get unlimited installs of Office on any device they have. You can split up the cost of Family by sharing it with other people if you want, Microsoft is okay with that. With Office 365, you are always on the latest versions of the software as it gets updated over time.

There is also a standalone copy of Microsoft Office. It's a perpetual license, meaning that you buy it one time and the software doesn't need to be paid for again. With Office standalone, it's for 1 user and for 1 device only. There are a few different versions

• Office 2021 - Home and Student. (Word, Excel and Powerpoint). $149
• Office 2021 - Home and Business (Same as above, but also has Outlook). $249
• Office 2021 - Professional. (All the above, plus Publisher and Access). $439.

If you find it online for substantially less than those prices, you are pretty much guaranteed that you are buying some type of volume license key that a retailer is selling that isn't being sold legitimately. It may work perfect, it may not work at all, and it may work for some period of time (as it did for you previously). There are no guarantees using these licenses, if Microsoft picks up on it they can block the key from working or activating again in the future. If the cost savings to you is somehow worth it, and you are willing to be out that money at any point in the future, this is your choice.

Personally, for $69 a year, the fact that get 1TB of cloud storage (which you almost cannot buy for $69 a year from any place else), if you have any use for it, is your best bet for using Microsoft Office. Office 365 is the way I have gone since 2016. I use Office on 4 different machines and if I had to buy 4 copies it would have been at least $1000 on day 1....instead I am at about $600 and I get 6TB of storage, I share my subscription with my dad. And I can cancel at any time that office is not essential to me and they stop charging me. If I bought 4 copies straight up, I would have spent more, been on an old version and wouldn't have the cloud storage space (which I use).