Apple Pages vs. LibreOffice Writer: Which Wins in 2025? 🚀
Key Aspects
- Pages is Mac-specific, modern and easy to use, with no clutter.
- LibreOffice Writer is feature-rich, but its usability is subpar.
- Writer excels at Word compatibility, but Pages offers Apple intelligence and cloud support.
All Macs come with a free word processing application called Pages. While it's excellent, if you're looking for something that integrates better with Microsoft Word, you might want to try LibreOffice Writer, which is free and open source. So how do they compare? 🤔
Pages looks more modern and is designed for Macs
There's no denying that LibreOffice Writer doesn't have an attractive design. It clearly wasn't designed for Mac. In fact, it barely resembles an application designed for modern systems.
With the default settings, it uses old-fashioned toolbars filled with large icons that are a throwback to the past. The app supports themes and icon packs that help improve its appearance, although quality may vary. While you're making those changes, you'll also probably want to spend some time customizing the toolbars to avoid icon overload.
Alternatively, you can enable the tabbed interface to make Writer look more like Microsoft Word. However, it still feels cluttered and lacks a touch of sophistication.
In contrast, Apple Pages is a fully macOS app. It's sleek and streamlined, and the features you don't need are simply left out. ✨
Instead of multiple icon-filled toolbars or a ribbon, you have a simplified toolbar and access most formatting tools and other features through a context-sensitive sidebar. It takes some getting used to if you're coming from an interface like Word, but it's a very accessible approach once you get the hang of it.
Writer is packed with features, but that makes it difficult to use.
The clean design of Apple Pages makes it very easy to use once you get used to it. That simplified toolbar It allows you to easily add common features to your documents, such as page numbers, line breaks, footnotes, and more. It also makes more advanced formatting, such as tables, charts, and images, more accessible. 📊
Pages uses many templates to help you get started creating different types of documents. Whether you're writing a book, designing a party invitation, or need to mail merge some envelopes, the nearly 100 templates are available right when you open the app. 🎉
LibreOffice, on the other hand, simply throws you at a blank page. It offers 10 templates for text documents, but they're pretty basic and pale in comparison to what you get in Pages.
Like many open-source programs, LibreOffice Writer doesn't skimp on features, but finding what you need isn't as easy as it could be. If you're willing to spend time customizing toolbars and exploring the endless preference options, you can configure it to fit your workflow perfectly. 🛠️
However, if you have better things to do, Pages' approach to providing the most used features may be a better fit for you.
Writer has better compatibility with Word—and other applications
One area where LibreOffice Writer definitely excels is its Word compatibility. By default, Writer saves in ODT format (which is now better supported in Word), but you can change it to use DOCX if needed. 📝
Obviously, the more complex the document, the greater the likelihood of encountering errors when opening it. But for the most part, Writer works well with Word files. Things like comments and footnotes are preserved, along with images, charts, and more. In fact, you can save directly to DOCX format, which Pages can't. 🚫
And Writer's compatibility doesn't end there. Not only does it support several other formats, but it can even open Pages documents. Performance in this case is somewhat variable, and you can't save in Pages format, but it's still nice to have that option.
Pages falls quite short in its compatibility with Word. It's best to think of it as a Word replacement, not an alternative. If you frequently need to work with Word documents, especially if they're shared with others, it won't work for you. 📉
For example, I opened a test DOCX file containing a chart, a table, an image, a footnote, and a comment. While much of the document was fine, Pages took longer to open and displayed numerous warnings, primarily about font differences, but also about an incompatible chart. While Writer displayed a fully editable chart, Pages left a large blank space.
To complicate matters, once you open and edit a Word document, you can't save changes to the file itself. Pages saves everything in Pages format. If you want to save a DOCX or any other file, you'll have to export it as a new file each time.
The basic features are similar, unless you need Apple smarts.
In general use, both apps work as expected. You can create all kinds of word-processed documents, and despite the differences in the interface, it's easy to add the basic formatting you need. If you just need a decent writing app, either one will work for you. ✍️
However, there are two aspects that stand out in Pages. The first is that, after save a document by For the first time, the app automatically saves as you type. There's little to no chance of losing your work, unlike Writer, which will have you constantly pressing Command+S. 💾
Secondly, Writer does not support the new Apple's intelligence writing toolsIf you've gotten used to using the proofreading option to quickly review your work before sending it to someone, you're in luck, because Pages has it all. 🏆
Cloud and collaboration are missing from Writer
When it comes to more advanced features, LibreOffice has almost everything you need, but it falls short in a couple of key areas. 😕
You can create extremely rich documents in both apps, with some minor differences. Writer, for example, offers finer control over what you want to do; Pages has slightly better media options.
Pages also works as a desktop publishing tool through Design Mode. LibreOffice has a similar feature called Draw, but it's a separate application within the LibreOffice suite. Where Pages stands out is in its more modern features.
First, there's cloud support. Simply put, LibreOffice doesn't have any. Instead, you have to set up and store your documents to a third-party cloud service like OneDrive or Google Drive. Pages is fully integrated with iCloud. Your files are automatically saved there, where they'll be available on your other Apple devices or through a web browser, and you can share them with others. ☁️
And then there's collaboration. In Writer, you can add comments and send your file to someone else, but that's pretty much it. With Pages, up to 100 people can work on a document at the same time (and they don't even need Apple accounts). 🤝
What is the best word processor for Mac?
Compare Apple Pages and LibreOffice Writer It comes down to one question: do you need your word processor to be compatible with Microsoft Word? If you do, and you use complex files and share them with others, then Writer is the way to go. Pages is fine for occasional DOCX use, but you wouldn't want to do it constantly. 🆗
Otherwise, it's hard to think of a reason not to use Pages. It's much nicer, faster, more streamlined, and feels like a proper Mac app. Plus, its collaboration, cloud computing, and Apple intelligence features make Writer feel somewhat dated. 🥇
Although Pages isn't a widely supported format, you can overcome any compatibility issues by exporting your files in DOCX or PDF formats, either in the app or to iCloud on the web. If you haven't used Apple Pages recently, it's time to give it another try. 🎈
